This dream state could go on for ten or fifteen minutes until the sound of a ringing telephone or an interruption from one of her colleagues would bring her back to earth. Sometimes, when feelings of sorrow threatened to tip over into despair, she would leave the office and walk briskly to Willett’s Wood, where she would follow the path they had taken together at their last meeting and allow herself to shed some restorative tears.
She knew that she was not doing a good job of disguising her unhappiness at work because, having once treated her as one of the chaps, people were suddenly either avoiding her or being uncharacteristically sensitive. Unpopular work that would normally have come her way was being diverted to other departments; volunteers mysteriously came forward to take on jobs that she had started and failed to follow up.
Instead of cadging a cigarette off her several times a day, Larry would bring her a custard tart from the bakery in Petts Wood on his way into work and leave it on her desk. Even the fearsome Muriel stopped her in the washroom, where Jean had gone to splash cold water on her face, and offered to bring in a pamphlet from the School of Yoga, which promoted dynamic breathing and other rejuvenating techniques. People are kind, Jean told herself. I’m very fortunate.
The evenings were a trial, because it grew dark so early and there was too much time to think, but she was kept busy answering her mother’s bell. Misery was tiring, so she went to bed early, but it also stopped her from sleeping, so she woke unrefreshed.
She tried to remember what life was like before she had met the Tilburys, just six months ago. The days had passed without great peaks and valleys of emotion; her job and the domestic rituals that went with each season had been sufficiently varied and rewarding to occupy her. Small pleasures—the first cigarette of the day; a glass of sherry before Sunday lunch; a bar of chocolate parceled out to last a week; a newly published library book, still pristine and untouched by other hands; the first hyacinths of spring; a neatly folded pile of ironing, smelling of summer; the garden under snow; an impulsive purchase of stationery for her drawer—had been encouragement enough.
She wondered how many years—if ever—it would be before the monster of awakened longing was subdued and she could return to placid acceptance of a limited life. The journey into love was so effortless and graceful; the journey out such a long and labored climb.
One evening, when her mother was settled for the night and the walls of the house were pressing in, Jean slipped out and walked up to the church. She was not religious, but she thought of herself as culturally Christian and had accompanied her mother to services on the major festivals, before the falling-out over the knitted dolls.
Choir practice was just finishing and the singers were leaving, buttoning coats against the chilly night and calling farewells to each other, so Jean hung back in the rectory garden until the last of the footsteps had died away. The heavy wooden door was still unlocked, so she let herself into the cool darkness and sat in a pew at the back, as if prepared to make a quick getaway from God, should He appear.
The only light came from a bright moon through the stained-glass windows. The altar gleamed palely; all was peaceful. She had never been in the habit of praying, for herself or other people, and wouldn’t stoop to it now just because she was needy. Instead, she sat contemplating the silence, and the smell of polished wood and candle wax and ancient stone. Minutes passed and she felt her eyes filling with tears, which she allowed to flow down her cheeks, gather at the corners of her mouth and drip off her chin unchecked.
There was a sudden noise—shocking in the stillness—and a shaft of light as the door to the vestry opened. Jolted from her trance, Jean hurriedly wiped her face on her coat sleeve as Mrs. Melsom, no less startled, appeared in the doorway.
“Oh my goodness,” she said, clutching her chest and peering into the gloom. “I wasn’t expecting anyone to be here still.”
She was wearing a fur hat that might have done service in the Russian steppes and sheepskin mittens that were somewhat disabling her efforts with the latch.
“Sorry,” said Jean, rising. “I was just . . .”
“Oh, it’s you, Jean,” Mrs. Melsom said. “I didn’t mean to alarm you. I stayed behind after choir to sort out the sheet music—it was all in a muddle.” She looked closer. “My dear, is something wrong?”
Jean blinked hard. She could take the path of denial and hasty departure, or accept the sympathy that was offered. A memory nudged at her—the downtrodden daughter from the hotel in Lymington, refusing her hand of friendship. She had clung to her proud self-sufficiency and they had both been diminished that night. Insight, overdue but dazzling, opened Jean’s eyes to the truth that when help is accepted, both parties are enriched.