VI. Martin #3
I noticed, also, the hulking quorum of security guards at the entrance of the chapel and, after all, it would be remiss of Ben not to invite his old chum Edward Buller.
He loves to demonstrate their closeness to the rest of the world.
I’ve followed it all in the press over the years: photos of Buller at Fizmaurice family christenings, reports of Ben having spent weekends at Chequers, joint holidays in Italian villas loaned by pop stars, and the frequently reprinted black and white images of the two of them at university formal halls, chins tipped towards the camera as if issuing a challenge to the country they were about to rule.
I’ve tried, again and again, to get Fleet Street editors interested in Ben’s murky past, but to no avail. They seem to expect criminality and callousness in the ruling class – more than that, they actually seem to want it.
‘Of course Ed’s coming,’ Serena says, bundling me into a pew.
‘You’re sitting with cousin Roger – sorry about that – and one of Fliss’s friends from Bali. Derek. Big Black man. Dreadlocks. You can’t miss him.’
In the empty pew, there are orders of service, each one bearing the photo at the front of the church. Everywhere, Fliss’s eyes follow us.
Serena untangles her arm from mine. Her jacket sleeve is pushed up and I see puncture marks in the crook of her elbow, a blooming bruise. She sees me looking.
‘Blood tests,’ she says, as if that explains it. ‘I’ll see you after the service, Martin.’
She turns. The dress swishes. I watch her silhouette as she walks up the chapel aisle, head held aloft, refusing to catch anyone’s eye. She recedes into the PVC marquee, back into the sunlight, back into her wonderful, terrible life – the one she so clearly wants to escape from.
I am the first person seated in my pew so, for several minutes, I can observe uninterrupted as the other members of the congregation take their places.
Next to Lady Katherine, I can see four profiles I imagine must belong to Ben and Serena’s children.
I’ve never paid them much attention. When couples have more than two offspring, they all merge into one amoebic whole for me.
It’s been six years since I last saw this particular brood.
There are two teenage girls, one blonde and pretty, wearing lip gloss and heavy mascara, hair pulled tightly back into a bun; the other with a chopped dark bob and glowering eyebrows, arms crossed.
The two boys are … well, boyish. The older one, who must be Hector, my godson, has spots on his face and a general unwashed air.
He has yet to grow into his looks and I’m not sure the looks are even on the horizon to be grown into.
The youngest – what’s he called? Lion? Apple?
– is hunched forward, fingers moving frantically, and it isn’t until I peer over my glasses that I can see he’s playing a computer game.
Well, better that than playing with himself, I suppose.
‘Hey, brother.’
I look up. A tall man, who must be Derek, given that he is the only non-white person in the chapel, slides in next to me.
‘Hello.’
He takes out the knee cushion from beneath the bench and, to my surprise, immediately kneels and begins to pray, silently moving his mouth to unknown words. When he sits back, he says, ‘Were you a friend, then?’
‘Me?’ I say, stupidly. ‘No. I mean. Yes. I used to be.’
Derek takes this in, then pats my shoulder.
‘Difficult times,’ he says. ‘Difficult times.’
I pick at the skin around the cuticle of my left thumb. There is a hangnail that has been annoying me for days. After a while, I become aware that Derek is expecting me to say something.
‘And you?’ I proffer, a touch too late.
‘Yeah, yeah. Met her in Bali. You know what it’s like.’
I don’t.
‘She was a lot of fun.’ Derek gives a sad laugh. ‘Didn’t know she was going to take her own life though, did I?’ He starts talking to himself, muttering plaintive words. ‘Why did you do that, honey? Why?’
Now he is crying. Not just crying but sniffing and sobbing, his shoulders shaking.
I offer him my pocket square. He takes it, gratefully, and mops his eyes. He tries to give it back to me but I let him keep it.
‘I’m sorry, I’m not sure I quite heard … Did you say …’ I tread carefully. ‘That Fliss … killed herself?’
‘Well, that’s not what this lot are saying.’ He jerks his head towards the family pews. ‘I dunno why they’re spinning that story. Makin’ her sound like a junkie strung out on drugs an’ drink an’ all sorts. She were clean. Good as. She killed herself.’
‘And you know that because …?’
‘She left me a note, didn’t she?’
‘What did it say?’
Derek glances at me. He gives a long, slow blink.
‘She just needed to end the pain. She’d been through hell. What they did to her …’
He trails into silence and I am prevented from pushing any further by the organ striking up.
Rhythmic, mournful music fills the chapel.
The coffin, held aloft by six pallbearers, makes its slow way down the aisle.
The black feathers on Lady Katherine’s hat shiver as she stands.
Ben and Serena are next to each other now in the front pew.
I watch as Serena grabs the computer game from her youngest and exchanges it for an order of service.
I wonder why Ben hadn’t been carrying the coffin too.
His hair is long at the back, curling over his collar.
I used to know that neck so well, the way it felt after he’d been to the barber’s, the velveteen stubble of it.
I experience a moment of pure dissociation.
Here I am again, in the stately home where I used to spend my school holidays trying so feverishly to be accepted as an honorary Fitzmaurice.
The scholarship boy whose fear could only be salved by self-betrayal.
I can picture the teenage Fliss now: sitting on the window seat of her bedroom, one leg dangling down.
Doc Marten boots and a faded AC/DC T-shirt tucked into denim cut-offs. A single purple strand in her hair.
What they did to her. Derek’s words ricochet in my head, pinball sharp.
I watch as Ben rises from his seat and steps up to the pulpit.
Ben removes a folded piece of paper from his inside jacket pocket and smoothes it out with a sweep of his hand. The audience – for that is what we now are – holds its anticipation like a physical object. All of this is intentional pacing. A politician’s trick. In a moment, he’ll be clearing—
Ben clears his throat. He presses the knuckle of his thumb to his right eye, though there are no tears. When he removes his hand, his gaze is soulful.
‘My sister Felicity was utterly unique,’ he starts.
Next to me, Derek murmurs in agreement.
‘She could alter a room’s energy simply by walking into it.
And often, she wouldn’t just walk in, she’d rush in, filled with passion for the latest project she had or the latest person she’d met or this wonderful new spice she’d found on her travels that we really had to try.
And as many of you know, Fliss loved her spices. Like, really loved them.’
A hum of rueful laughter. God, the smugness of it. How could they stand themselves?
‘She was also, as many of you know, a complicated person—’ He breaks off.
Derek shifts in his seat next to me. A pungent, damp smell rises from his feet and I try to ignore it.
‘Yes, she was that. A complicated, glittering person …’
Glittering? Fucking hell.
‘… who bravely fought her own demons for many years.’
Christ. He might as well have carved ‘She was a massive drug addict’ into the chapel walls.
‘And in the end—’ Ben’s voice cracks, right on cue. ‘My apologies – if I can just …’
He whisks out a silky handkerchief, dabbing at his face, then straightens his shoulders, exhales and gives another rueful smile.
‘Right. Enough of that.’
A smattering of sympathetic noises from the congregation.
‘And in the end, those demons were bigger than her. It was a tragic accident that ended her life’ – at this, Derek stiffens – ‘and perhaps none of us could have done anything to prevent it. But I can’t help but blame myself.
If she’d been happier, if she’d been sober – as she had been for so many months before this final lapse – if she’d been here with us at home, then perhaps she wouldn’t have done that most Fliss-like of things.
Perhaps she wouldn’t have walked into the Balinese sea and gone for a moonlight swim.
But that was Fliss, wasn’t it? Dear, darling Fliss.
Beholden to her passions until her final breath.
At least, I comfort myself, she died doing a thing she loved.
That makes the injustice of this terrible accident a bit easier to bear. ’
Derek sucks his teeth. He jabs my arm with his elbow.
‘Ain’t an accident, man, why they saying that?’
He is sitting so close to me our thighs are touching. His trousers have purple patches sewn over the knees. On his feet, I am surprised to see flip-flops.
‘And so we wish you farewell, sweet, sweet Fliss,’ Ben is saying now, addressing his closing words to the coffin, which is draped in heavy, braided material bearing the Fitzmaurice coat of arms. ‘May your final swim be to the peace that you deserve, and may the ocean rise to meet you there.’
The congregation is applauding now – a soft pitter-patter at first, rising to a polite yet noticeable crescendo.
There’s Serena, smiling sadly, a tendril of hair working itself loose from her chignon.
Lady Katherine’s back is erect and unmoving.
She gave birth to three children and has outlived two of them and a husband. The survival instincts of a cockroach.
‘She weren’t using, you know.’ Derek’s voice pulls me back.
‘I’m sorry, what?’
He brings his face to within an inch of mine. His eyes are bloodshot, the whites yellowing.