‘You are tall, I suppose.’
She laughs, and it’s unexpected and surprisingly joyful, like the room is suddenly full of bubbles.
Julie arrives with a tray and unloads the drinks. Coffee for them, tea for me. And three slices of Victoria sponge.
‘I didn’t ask for cake,’ I say.
‘I thought I’d treat us,’ she says.
It’s a long time since I had cake and when I take a bite I’m flooded with memories of birthdays and silly hats.
‘Have you told Patty about our mission?’ Julie asks, once she’s settled.
‘Mission?’
‘To find your friend? She might have some ideas.’
‘Oh,’ I say. I feel a bit hot and uncomfortable. I’m not sure I’m ready to talk about Dot to anyone else.
Julie doesn’t notice, and ploughs on. ‘Mabel had this best friend, when she was younger, but she hasn’t seen her since they were in their twenties. We’re going to try to find her.’
‘Oh boy,’ Patricia says. ‘That sounds like a challenge.’
‘I thought it was common in America to believe us Brits all know each other,’ I say.
Patricia laughs again. More bubbles. ‘Only the ones who haven’t been here.’
There is a beat of silence, and I take another mouthful of cake, close my eyes briefly to appreciate it.
‘When you knew her, all those years ago, where did she live? Around here, I mean,’ Patricia asks.
‘Manor Lane, number forty-two.’
‘Have you been there?’
I’m not sure what she’s getting at. ‘You think she might have been there all this time?’
‘No, of course not, but someone there might know something about where she went. Worth a try, surely, since it doesn’t involve going very far.’
I want to say that the house has probably changed hands many times since Dot’s family left it. And besides, the rest of the family didn’t leave along with her, so it’s not like the next owner would have a forwarding address for her specifically.
‘That’s a brilliant idea,’ Julie says. ‘Why didn’t we think of that, Mabel? I don’t know. Good job we’ve got Patty on board.’
I think about that phrase later, ‘on board’。 Is this a group project now? How many more will join in? And will any of it help? When I’m drifting off to sleep, I let go of the worry about it all, the questions about whether or not I’m doing the right thing. I let myself remember the dancing, the way it felt to be moving around that big space with songs I hadn’t heard for years playing at volume. And I remember the cake, the lightness of the sponge, the richness of the icing. So when Arthur is there beside me, suddenly, I smile at him.
‘It’s been a good day,’ I say.
He doesn’t say anything.
‘Why are you here, Arthur? Have you got something to tell me, or to show me?’
He smiles the way he always did when he had a secret and he wasn’t quite ready to give it up. Playful. It makes him look young. And it infuriates me. I reach across to give him a gentle push, but the bed is empty.
13
I was a bit taken aback when Julie and Patricia said they’d both come with me to Dot’s old house to see if we could find anything out. But then, I know Julie’s floundering without Martin and Patricia lives on her own, so maybe they haven’t got anything better to do. A thought comes to mind. Perhaps while they’re helping me, I could help them. I get out the list I made, think again about how happy this would make Arthur.
1. Get in touch with friends and family
2. Contact the funeral parlour
3. Go to the supermarket
4. Clean the house
5. Find D
Items one to four are crossed off, now, but I add two new items to the end.
6. Help Julie get her husband back
7. Find out why Patricia is alone
So when they turn up on the doorstep, I get right to it.
‘Have you always lived on your own, Patricia?’
She opens her mouth and I know she’s going to ask me to call her Patty, but then she closes it again.
‘No,’ she says. ‘Until recently, my daughter and granddaughters lived with me.’
She is wearing a navy dress with a bold floral pattern and brown leather ankle boots. Could I wear something like that? I would always have said no, but it looks great on her. I remind myself that she used to be an actual model. Turn my attention to what she just said. There’s a story there.
‘Ah, and where have they moved to?’
‘Up near Manchester. My daughter, Sarah, met someone online and they’ve decided to make a go of it.’
I can hear in her voice that this is hard. She doesn’t approve.
‘And how old are the little ones?’
‘Six and four.’
Julie’s looking from me to Patricia and back again. This is all news to her, it seems.
‘You must miss them,’ I say.
‘Oh, I do. Terribly.’
So there it is. She’s lonely too. All three of us, on our own. Julie goes over to Patricia and puts an arm around her, and it looks a bit awkward because Patricia towers over Julie, but they make it work. Patricia pulls a tissue from her trouser pocket and blows her nose. I should say sorry, I suppose, for upsetting her, but it was in a good cause. I can’t help her if I don’t know what the problem is, can I?
‘Shall we go, then?’ I say instead.
I haven’t walked past Dot’s old house much, over the years. At first it was a conscious thing, and then it wasn’t, but it’s a bit out of the way, not on one of the routes Arthur and I used to take again and again around the village. From my house, you have to go towards the centre of town but then veer off just before you get there, and then there’s a maze of little streets and Manor Lane is one of them. When we get to the bit where you turn off, I find my feet are just taking me there, as if I’m back in the time when I made this journey so often, as if the decades have fallen away. I go second left and then third right, and Julie is sure we’re getting lost, but I know we’re not. And then we’re on Manor Lane, and I’m going past the houses on her street until I get to forty-two and stand in front of it, looking.
It’s smaller. I mean, it isn’t, of course, but I always thought of it as quite imposing and it’s just an ordinary family house. Victorian semi. I look at the window that Dot’s brother once broke with a cricket ball. The door’s changed colour. Once black, now a bright blue.
‘This the one?’ Patricia asks.
It strikes me as a silly question so I don’t bother to answer it.
‘Mabel?’ Julie asks, touching my elbow.
‘What?’
‘Is this Dot’s old house?’
‘Well, of course it is. Why do you think I’m staring at it?’
She does that raucous laugh of hers and just then, the front door opens and a smartly dressed middle-aged man looks a bit surprised to find three women standing looking at his house.
‘Can I help you?’ he asks, pulling the door closed behind him.
‘My friend used to live here,’ I say. ‘In the forties and fifties. Her name was Dot Brightmore.’
He shifts from one foot to the other, taps his car keys on his wrist. Waits for me to go on.