Page 16 of The House of Hopes and Dreams
I was flagging, but on to the last page, and Willow must have felt the same by this point, because the larder seemed largely to have defeated her. The jams, pickles and chutneys lined up on the shelves were clearly labelled with mine or Molly’s names and the dates we’d put them up and I wasn’t about to come to blows over who owned the vegetable rack or the large cake stand with a glass dome over it.
‘I think Willow’s head would look nice under that,’ said Julian’s clear, cool and amused voice, and I turned quickly as if I expected to find him there. But of course he wasn’t, even though I’d felt his occasional presence ever since last night’s visit to the studio, and been comforted by it.
At the bottom of the final page Willow must have had a sudden last burst of enthusiasm, for she had even listed the gardening tools in the shed, not to mention the pots and bags of bark chippings in the old outhouse. Was there no part of my home she hadn’t inquisitively sifted through? It was as if she was trying to pull out long threads from the tapestry of my life, so that it fell into holes before my eyes.
By now, hours had slipped by and the short day was fading, as I suppose the sense of Julian’s presence and his voice in my head would slowly vanish over the coming days, for they were no more than an echo of the past.
It occurred to me that my life was falling into a kind of pattern: the idyllic near-decade of golden childhood with Carey, the lonely wasteland of boarding school, the joyful reunion at uni, and then the happy years with Julian. Now it was time for another lonely wasteland bit, though this time I still had Carey.
I was suddenly desperate to ring him and hear his familiar, dear, deep warm voice. I thought he must be out of rehab and staying with Nick by now, but he had had so much to endure that I didn’t feel it would be fair to burden him with my woes just before Christmas.
Anyway, he’d be totally frustrated that he couldn’t rush up here to support me through all this, and that was the last thing I wanted.
But still, it was comforting to know he was there. In the New Year, when things were more sorted in my mind and I knew where I stood, I’d talk to him. I might even go down and stay with him and Nick for a couple of days – but not while Willow was poised like an albino vulture over my precious possessions.
I went back into the kitchen and highlighted all my stuff in bright pink, then propped Willow’s copy against the teapot, before forcing down a meal I didn’t want and setting off for the workshop. I felt I could work again, now. Imustwork.
The comfortingly familiar and beloved environment folded round me like downy wings as I settled to cutting out a roundel of clear glass and grinding black enamel paint on a slab. Then I placed Julian’s drawing of the angel with my face on the light-box and traced it on to the roundel, using a long, fine brush. When that had dried I added a little stippling detail with a fatter and stiffer badger-hair one, to give depth.
When it was completed, I put it in a tray in the rack ready to be fired and then carried on and painted some of the pieces of the rose window that were laid out ready, too. You can’t think about other things while painting glass: you have to concentrate.
I had coffee at some point and a couple of the fig roll biscuits from the tin, which were Julian’s favourite, then later dozed off in my office chair for a while.
When I woke, I felt reluctant to go back to the cottage, so it was very late when finally I locked up and set off under a cold, silvery-sequin-starred sky.
Nat’s car was in the drive and as soon as I entered the kitchen, I spotted that Willow’s copy of the inventory had vanished.
It would have been too much to hope that Nat and Willow would have done the same.
When Mr Revell arrived, I was engaged in painting the face of the Virgin Mary on to a piece of clear glass over a cartoon of my own design. I had been determined that she should not wear the self-satisfied and even smug simper so common in ecclesiastical windows.
I looked up as Father ushered our visitor through the room where I was working and my brush momentarily stilled, for he was the embodiment of how I imagined an angel would look – tall, slender and with burnished red-gold hair, pale skin and eyes of an unusual blue with a hint of purple, like harebells or violets …
He also appeared much younger than I expected, though that might have been his air of boyish enthusiasm. I learned later that he was in fact thirty-four, more than ten years my senior.
7
Clear as Glass
I got up just after five, as I used to before Julian’s illness, though then my mind was always buzzing with ideas and I was eager to start each new day. That seemed a very long time ago.
But there was still work to be done. The painting and silver-staining of Julian’s final window commission must be completed in the way he would have wanted.
Luckily Nat and Willow didn’t seem to be early risers, so I ate my toast and drank my coffee in peace, before going down to the workshop. The theme of the window was Noah and the Flood, and I put on Julian’s CD of Benjamin Britten’sNoye’s Fluddeto play in the background, just as he would if he’d been there. And actually, it felt as if he still was …
By the time Grant arrived at half past eight, I’d painted the rest of the glass for one of the few remaining panels, ready to be fired in the kiln along with the angel’s head.
I made us both coffee and, after he’d said how sorry he was about Julian, we turned to discussing the work in hand, before I glanced at my watch and told him I’d better get off to see the solicitor.
‘I need to know how I stand, because Nat seemed so certain he was entitled to take over the workshop and everything straight away.’
‘Perhaps he is, though it doesn’t seem right to me,’ Grant said, shaking his head. ‘Molly told me how they treated you when you got home on Saturday, too. They should be ashamed of themselves and I’d like to give that Nat a thick ear!’
‘Theywerevery unpleasant, but please don’t say anything to Nat,’ I begged him. ‘He’s spiteful enough to sack you if you do, even though he’d be cutting his nose off to spite his face. He couldn’t run the workshop without you.’
‘Well, he’s a good enough craftsman in the field himself – he’s got on well at that big leaded light firm in London – so he might think he could. Still, let’s see what the solicitor says first, then we’ll know where we all stand,’ he said sensibly. ‘I’ve been here since I left school and didn’t think I’d ever work anywhere else, but if it comes to it, then there are other firms who’d take me on in a flash.’
‘I’m certain they would,’ I said, because he was an excellent craftsman with years of experience. ‘But let’s see what I find out.’
