Chapter 37
THIRTY-SEVEN
ORLA
Memory is a perverse faculty! For the past week, I have been racking – or is it wracking?
– my brains on Laurel’s behalf, trying to recall the incident with Gray that I mentioned to her, which might or might not have been the clue she is searching for.
Now, as I lie here hastily filling these three pages as the sky outside my bedroom window lightens, it is there in my mind, as clear as if it had always been there.
It was Iseult who reminded me. She has taken to waking me in the mornings by standing on my chest, reaching out a paw and tapping my face, then – when that is ineffective – extending a claw to prick my skin.
It is just what my Maud used to do. Lying here, resistant to being woken, I let my thoughts drift to my old cat, with all her quirks and foibles, and a picture – or rather a film, for it was fully there with movement and sound – came back to me.
It was after a meeting of the historic buildings Preservation Trust two years or so back.
Somewhat guiltily, I’d roped Gray into joining the society, hoping he would be an ally against the faction that supports allowing a supermarket chain to take over Imran’s shabby newsagent shop.
We had sat through the meeting together, and afterwards I invited Gray back here for a drink by way of thanks.
I sat him down in the chaise longue in the living room.
On the table there was a pile of glossy magazines: Beatrice, my musical daughter – so unlike me in that regard – subscribes to The Strad, and while she was abroad she asked to have them delivered here.
While we were chatting, Maud strolled into the room, slightly stiff and arthritic as she was by then, before taking a leap up on to the table.
Poor soul – she must have misjudged her distance or forgotten that the glossy pages were there, because she landed on top of the pile and it – and she – went skidding to the floor.
She was fortunately unharmed and, as cats do, immediately set to washing herself, as if to convince us that that was exactly what she had intended to happen.
We laughed, and Gray got down on all fours to gather up the scattered magazines while I went to the kitchen to fetch some ice. While I was there, I could hear him remarking dismissively about their contents.
Rachmaninoff’s Second – God, who’d want to sit through that?
Philip Glass must be the most overrated composer of all time.
I remember Blodwyn Griffiths playing when she was sixteen and she’s still at it, poor woman.
When I returned with glasses, ice and a bottle of single malt whisky on a tray, I found Gray sitting by the fireplace, a page open in front of him, staring at it as if he had seen a ghost.
Are you all right? I asked. Would you like a splash of water with this?
For a moment it was as if he hadn’t heard me. Then he shook his head as if to banish a bothersome fly, closed the magazine and replaced it on the pile.
I will be when I’ve had a drink, he said. Just a blast from the past.
But his face was quite white, and he drank his whisky like it was medicine.
We continued our conversation, and the incident – which had only been fleeting – passed from my mind completely. A month or so later Beatrice returned, and I handed over the magazines along with her other post.
What did he see in the pages that day? I will send Beatrice a message and find out whether she still has that collection of journals – likely she will, because she is quite the hoarder.
I feel as if I am close to finding a missing piece in the puzzle Laurel is trying to solve.