The Shortest Journey Read online

  THE SHORTEST JOURNEY

  by

  Hazel Holt

  SMASHWORDS EDITION

  * * * * *

  PUBLISHED BY:

  Coffeetown Press on Smashwords

  The Shortest Journey

  Copyright © 2010 by Hazel Holt

  Published by Coffeetown Press

  PO Box 95462 Seattle, WA 98145

  Contact: [email protected]

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Cover design by Sabrina Sun

  Copyright © 2010 by Hazel Holt

  ISBN: 978-1-60381-055-5 (Paper)

  ISBN: 978-1-60381-057-9 (ePub)

  ISBN: 978-1-60381-056-2 (Cloth)

  Smashwords Edition License Notes

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  * * * * *

  FOR JOY

  * * * * *

  Chapter One

  ‘Is a good family,’ Mrs Jankiewicz said, ‘but there is no title.’

  She was silent for a moment, contemplating this insurmountable flaw and I said quickly, ‘But Sophie is very happy with him.’

  ‘Oh, happy.’ Mrs Jankiewicz shrugged.

  ‘And,’ I pursued, ‘he is Polish and a Roman Catholic.’

  ‘Is true,’ she admitted. ‘Zofia’ – she gave her daughter’s name its proper pronunciation – ‘is a good Polish girl. She would not marry a foreigner.’

  We both sat quietly drinking our tea. It was a conversation we had had many times. Zofia Jankiewicz (now Zofia Borowska) was no longer a girl – she was my contemporary and I was now in my middle fifties – and she had been married for twenty years. But to the elderly no topic of conversation is ever quite finished; it can be brought out again and again, and each time a little more can be added to it.

  ‘His father was a captain with General Zajac in Tehran. His uncle was an attaché in London. Was a good family.’

  She was silent again and I looked round the room with my customary feeling of sadness. It was quite a good-sized room and had a nice view of the sea (that was one of the pleasant features of West Lodge, which made it superior to the other nursing homes in Taviscombe) but it was woefully inadequate to house all the objects that Mrs Jankiewicz had brought with her from her large house in Park Walk. Mrs Wilmot, the Matron, had tried to protest as, under Mrs Jankiewicz’s brisk supervision, ornamental rugs were nailed up on the walls, large pieces of ornately carved furniture were heaved into place and a multiplicity of heavy silver objects was distributed about the room. But such was the force of the old lady’s personality (although half-blind with cataracts and practically crippled with arthritis) that she was allowed to create around her in this unpromising setting a sort of little Poland-in-miniature. True, the staff muttered a little as they moved the objects to dust – but they did so under their breath, since Mrs Jankiewicz held autocratic views on domestic staff and they were all decidedly in awe of her.

  ‘Do you want some more tea, Sheila?’ she asked. ‘I will ring for the girl. Alas, I cannot give you proper tea in this place.’

  We both turned our heads and looked at the silver samovar sitting on a small table. That had been one battle she had not won. I regarded the samovar with affection. When I was a girl and had gone to tea with Sophie – we had been at school together – it had always seemed to me the most glamorous object imaginable. Indeed, the whole household was so different and so much more exciting than any other I had ever known. Dr Jankiewicz was a delightful man, quiet and agreeable, amused, I thought, by his exuberant wife, whose exotic conversation and foreign ways fascinated me. Sophie was simply my friend. English at school and ‘a good Polish girl’ at home, she led two lives, as all second-generation refugees seemed to do.

  But now Dr Jankiewicz was dead, and Sophie, who had also become a doctor, was married and living in Canada with her husband. Sophie had wanted her mother to go to Canada with them, but Mrs Jankiewicz had been firm.

  ‘Not another country.’ she said. ‘First was Poland, then Siberia, then Persia, then Lebanon, then England. I stay in England.’

  With her usual resolute practicality she had sold her house, forced a large number of objects upon a reluctant Sophie (‘Honestly, Sheila, it’s going to cost more to ship them out to Nova Scotia than all our fares put together! And where on earth are we going to put them in our apartment?’) and settled herself in at West Lodge. Here she rapidly gained ascendancy, so that after only a few months she was recognised as Chief Resident and both the other residents and the staff were, on the whole, proud of her, rather as one might be of a cumbersome but rare and valuable piece of furniture whose prestige compensates for its awkwardness.

  I was very fond of her, not only because I had reached the age when I valued things and people connected with my youth, but also for her own unique blend of warmth and eccentricity.

  ‘Mr Williams’s son came yesterday.’ she said. ‘Is a bad man, not good to his father. He comes only when he wants something – money, of course, for that business of his. But is throwing the good money after the bad – he will never make it pay because he does not work hard. Is wrong to give him more and I tell Mr Williams this, but he not listen to anyone, even to me.’

  Mrs Jankiewicz had channelled her still considerable energy into evolving an information system that made MI5 look like pitiful amateurs. She called it taking an interest. But hers was a benevolent autocracy; she was always on the look-out for wrongs done to any of the other old people.

  ‘Someone must see to their rights,’ she would say. ‘Is only me; their children do not care. They were not brought up well, like my Zofia.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I saw Mr Williams’s son the last time he came to see the old man. He struck me as a nasty piece of work, smarming round Matron and saying how lovely everything was.’

  Mrs Jankiewicz snorted. ‘He cannot have seen the dust in his father’s room. I went in there last week to tell him to come down to dinner with me and it was terrible. Was thick, everywhere. Is that girl Glenda, lazy, only thinking about boys! I have to tell her many times about the dust.’

  For someone with a sight problem Mrs Jankiewicz had an apparently miraculous ability to spot dust, grimy paintwork or the wrong shade of blue in a bed-jacket purchased at her command by one of the staff.

  I sought to change the subject to one less controversial. ‘What lovely flowers! Those chrysanthemums are such a beautiful shade of dusky pink.’

  Her face softened. ‘Are pretty – from Mrs Rossiter. She went shopping yesterday and bought them for me for a present to cheer me up, she said, because today is ten years since my poor Stanislas is dead. Mrs Rossiter is a kind person. You are kind, too,’ she said, taking my hand in hers. ‘You come to see me because you remember.’

  ‘He was such a dear man,’ I said. ‘I was so fond of him. And I know that one never stops missing them.’

  I too am a widow. My husband, Peter, died three years ago.

  ‘I do not think Mrs Rossiter misses her husband.’ Mrs Jankiewicz said. ‘That man was not a nice person at all.’

  I thought of Colonel Rossiter, a cold, unfriendly, ill-tempered man, and said, ‘No, he was horrid; she
was well rid of him. I did think that after he died she might have managed to have a more enjoyable life, but then she developed this heart trouble...’

  Mrs Jankiewicz snorted again. ‘Is not trouble,’ she said. ‘She is quite able to do things but they do not let her. If I have no more than that wrong with me then I would not be in this place but in my own home.’

  ‘But Thelma was very concerned about her mother – living in London and with a career, she couldn’t get down very often. She thought her mother would be safer here, where people can keep an eye on her.’

  ‘Too many people keep an eye in this place,’ Mrs Jankiewicz said. ‘Is no privacy.’

  I reflected that Mrs Jankiewicz’s own eyes (albeit dimmed with cataracts) contributed considerably to the residents’ lack of privacy.

  ‘Never,’ she continued, ‘does she have any choice, poor Mrs Rossiter, never any freedom.’ Her voice rose on this evocative word. ‘Always she must be doing what other people tell her, first her husband – that nasty man – now her children. Is no life, and now she is old and has never known freedom. I would not have been so. In Siberia I was more free than she is.’

  I was used to Mrs Jankiewicz’s tendency to dramatise things but I felt this was going a bit far.

  ‘Oh, I don’t think it’s that bad. I’m sure she doesn’t mind being here too much. I mean, she’s quite active and can get about. She gets a taxi to go shopping in Taunton. She even went up to London to a matinee last year. Thelma met her at Paddington – they went to Covent Garden. She had a lovely day.’

  ‘She did not want to go to Covent Garden.’ Mrs Jankiewicz said. ‘She does not like the ballet. She want to see a show by that man Noel someone...’

  ‘Noel Coward?’

  ‘Is in some small place, not grand like Covent Garden. Thelma not like places that are not grand.’

  ‘Still, it was a day out for her.’

  ‘But not what she want!’ Mrs Jankiewicz rounded off her circular argument, as she so often did, triumphantly.

  ‘Well, anyway...’ I gathered my gloves and bag and prepared to depart. ‘I thought I’d just pop in and see her now, while I’m here.’

  ‘Is good. She will enjoy to see you,’ she said benevolently.

  We embraced each other warmly and I went out into the corridor and up the stairs to Mrs Rossiter’s room. I knocked and a low voice murmured something which I took to be an invitation to go in.

  The room that I now entered was in complete contrast to the one I had just left. Where Mrs Jankiewicz had surrounded herself with reminders of her past, Mrs Rossiter’s room seemed almost bare. True, it was comfortably furnished, as all the rooms in that very expensive nursing home were, but the general effect was impersonal, like a well-designed hotel room. The only pieces of furniture that she had brought with her from her old home were a small desk of Regency design made of some dark wood with little gilded sphinxes for feet, a footstool covered in petit-point, a rather beautiful eighteenth-century French clock, a watercolour of Table Mountain in a simple gilt frame and a small ivory figure of a gazelle. The only other personal touches in the room were several pots of flowering plants and two photographs. One – the larger of the two – was a studio portrait of her daughter Thelma, a strikingly handsome woman with dark hair and large dark eyes. The other was a framed snapshot of a nondescript-looking man, youngish, fairish, unremarkable. This was her son Alan. She was sitting in a chair by the window but got to her feet to greet me as I came into the room.

  ‘Sheila!’ she cried. ‘What a lovely surprise.’

  As I gave her a hug I was dismayed to feel how much more frail she seemed since the last time I had seen her.

  ‘How are you?’ I asked with real concern.

  ‘Oh, I’m splendid,’ she said, ‘absolutely splendid.’

  ‘You look rather pale.’

  ‘I’ve had a bit of a cold and that’s kept me indoors. Now that I can get out and about again I’ll soon perk up. Just a little walk along the beach and I’ll be right as rain.’

  ‘It doesn’t look too inviting at the moment,’ I said, looking out of the window at the long stretch of sand, deserted and raked by wind and driving rain, and at the iron grey waves breaking in white lines on the shingle further along. ‘You’re better off indoors today.’

  ‘Yes, indeed. I’m very lucky to be here all safe and snug and warm, when you think of how some poor souls of my age have to live...’

  Her voice, which was always soft and hesitant, died away.

  ‘You’re settled in all right, I see.’

  ‘Oh, yes. Everyone has been so good – Thelma arranged everything. So difficult for her, having to come down from London every time. And Gordon has been wonderful. He came when Thelma couldn’t get away – though of course they couldn’t both be away from the office at the same time.’

  ‘Ah, yes, of course,’ I said.

  Thelma and her husband Gordon owned a high-powered, very successful advertising agency and had the sort of lifestyle that I only knew about from television commercials.

  ‘I see you’ve brought some of your things with you,’ I said. ‘It’s nice to have something familiar around you – it makes it seem more home-like.’

  ‘Yes, just a few odds and ends. As Thelma said, I don’t want to clutter up the room with too much stuff.’

  ‘Yes, it’s not very big, really, after all those enormous rooms at the Manor.’

  ‘Oh, I’m very comfortable,’ she said hastily. ‘And it’s got a lovely view – I do so love the sea.’

  ‘I’m glad you brought that little Regency desk,’ I said. ‘It’s so pretty – I’ve always admired it, ever since I was a child. I remember, when Mother and I used to come to tea – when I was very young – I used to sit on the floor and stroke the sphinxes!’

  She smiled. ‘Your mother was so kind to me, I used to love your visits. You were such a solemn little thing, very quiet and shy – not like Thelma.’

  I remembered Thelma as a child. She always took the lead in any activity, as if by right; I always felt that her peremptory manner was displeasing and unsuitable in one who was several years my junior. Alan was younger still, despised accordingly by his older sister, and never allowed to participate in any of our games.

  Mrs Rossiter laid a loving hand on the desk. ‘It is charming, isn’t it? Fancy you loving it all those years ago. I shall leave it to you in my will.’

  ‘Oh, no, you mustn’t,’ I said, deeply embarrassed. ‘I mean, I couldn’t possibly...’

  ‘Nonsense, my dear, I would like to think of it having a loving home when I am gone.’

  ‘No, really, you can’t – Thelma...’

  ‘Thelma took all the pieces she wanted when the Manor was sold.’

  ‘Well, Alan might...’

  ‘Alan’s abroad so much and when he is here he’s got no proper home to put anything in, just that tiny flat in Earl’s Court.’

  I never quite knew what Alan did – something to do with helping the Third World, digging wells or advising on crops. It all sounded very worthy but I got the impression that he hadn’t been inspired by any burning desire to help the underprivileged, but had simply drifted into it when he couldn’t think of anything else to do.

  ‘No, Sheila dear, there’s no one else I would rather have it. Accept it for your dear mother’s sake, if for nothing else!’

  My mother always had a soft spot for Mrs Rossiter. ‘That poor little soul!’ she called her. So we would quite often go to tea at the Manor – a gloomy seventeenth-century house with dark panelling and heavily leaded windows through which the light filtered greenly. I was a nervous child and Thelma used to delight in reminding me that the house was said to be haunted. I can still feel the slippery polished wood of the great staircase under my feet as I scuttled down the stairs from the gloom of the nursery passage to the blessed lights of the ground floor below and the reassuring presence of the grown-ups.

  ‘Well,’ I said hesitantly, ‘it’s very sweet o
f you ... but you mustn’t start talking about wills, you know.’

  ‘At my age, my dear, it is quite natural. I’ll drop a line to Mr Robertson.’

  To change the subject I said, ‘I’ve just been to see Mrs Jankiewicz. She was in splendid form!’

  Mrs Rossiter laughed. ‘She certainly keeps everyone here on their toes – I do envy her positive attitude to everything.’

  ‘I suppose, after all she’s been through, she simply takes each day as it comes and gets what she can out of it. And she certainly seems to enjoy life, even now.’

  ‘It is a great gift – almost the greatest. I had thought that now I’m old life would be simple, there would be no problems – but, somehow there are...’

  She sat by the window looking at but not seeing two figures in raincoats battling along the promenade against the wind, while a small dog ran round them in circles.

  She suddenly recollected herself and asked, ‘How is Michael?’

  ‘He’s in London now, at the College of Law. I was delighted, as you can imagine, when he said he wanted to be a solicitor. Peter would have been so pleased.’

  ‘He’s a dear boy – you’re very lucky.’

  ‘I know. I honestly don’t know how I would have got through when Mother died, and then Peter, so soon after, if it hadn’t been for Michael. When you have children you know you’ve got to carry on, for their sake.’

  She gave me a warm smile but didn’t say anything and I recollected that that had hardly been the situation when her husband died. It was Thelma, then, who had taken charge. As she had done ever since.

  We chatted a little about the old days and I was just on the point of leaving when there was a tap at the door and, not waiting for a reply, a small, sturdy figure came into the room.

  Annie Fisher was what used to be known as a ‘treasure’. She had been employed at the Manor for all of Mrs Rossiter’s married life. Beginning as a kitchen maid before the war, she had ended up running the whole establishment practically single-handed, since the Manor was really quite isolated and it was impossible to get any sort of living-in help. She had even nursed Colonel Rossiter during his last illness and that couldn’t have been easy, because he was difficult and tiresome enough when in full health and I couldn’t imagine that he was a particularly good patient. After he died, it was her energy and devotion that had made it possible for Mrs Rossiter to go on living at the Manor as long as she had done. A really admirable person, then, who had given her life selflessly to the care of her employers – and yet I always had a slight feeling of distaste whenever I met her. I can’t explain it – a sort of Dr Fell thing, Peter used to say, when I told him, and really it was as irrational as that.