Feeling dazed, Ellen followed her aunt into the kitchen, a narrow room decorated in greens and gold. She sat at the table and stared at the wallpaper, a pattern of fish and frying pans.
Her aunt was dying. It was totally unexpected. Her father’s older sister – but only eight years older, Ellen remembered. And her father was a vigorously healthy man, a man still in the prime of life. She looked at her aunt, saw her moving painfully slowly from cupboard to counter to shelf, preparing a lunch.
Ellen rose. ‘Let me do it, Aunt May.’
‘No, no, dear. I know where everything is, you see. You don’t. I can still get around all right.’
‘Does Dad know about you? When was the last time you saw him?’
‘Oh, dear me, I didn’t want to burden him with my problems. We haven’t been close for years, you know. I suppose I last saw him – why, it was at your wedding, dear.’
Ellen remembered. That had been the last time she had seen Aunt May. She could hardly believe that woman and the one speaking to her now were the same. What had happened to age her so in only three years?
May set a plate on the table before Ellen. A pile of tuna and mayonnaise was surrounded by sesame crackers.
‘I don’t keep much fresh food on hand,’ she said. ‘Mostly canned goods. I find it difficult to get out shopping much anymore, but then I haven’t much appetite lately, either. So it doesn’t much matter what I eat. Would you like some coffee? Or tea?’
‘Tea, please. Aunt May, shouldn’t you be in a hospital? Where someone would care for you?’
‘I can care for myself right here.’
‘I’m sure Dad and Mom would love to have you visit . . .’
May shook her head firmly.
‘In a hospital they might be able to find a cure.’
‘There’s no cure for dying except death, Ellen.’
The kettle began to whistle, and May poured boiling water over a teabag in a cup.
Ellen leaned back in her chair, resting the right side of her head against the wall. She could hear a tiny, persistent, crunching sound from within the wall – termites?
‘Sugar in your tea?’
‘Please,’ Ellen responded automatically. She had not touched her food, and felt no desire for anything to eat or drink.
‘Oh, dear,’ sighed Aunt May. ‘I’m afraid you’ll just have to drink it plain. It must have been a very long time since I used this – there are more ants here than sugar grains.’
Ellen watched her aunt drop the whole canister into the garbage can.
‘Aunt May, is money a problem? I mean, if you’re staying here because you can’t afford – ’
‘Bless you, no.’ May sat down at the table beside her niece. ‘I have some investments and enough money in the bank for my own needs. And this house is my own, too. I bought it when Victor retired, but he didn’t stay long enough to help me enjoy it.’
In a sudden rush of sympathy, Ellen leaned over and would have taken her frail aunt in her arms, but May fluttered her hand in a go-away motion, and Ellen drew back.
‘With Victor dead, some of the joy went out of fixing it up. Which is why it still looks much the same old wreck it was when I bought it. This property was a real steal because nobody wanted the house. Nobody but me and Victor.’ May cocked her head suddenly and smiled. ‘And maybe you? What would you say if I left this house to you when I die?’
‘Aunt May, please don’t – ’
‘Nonsense. Who better? Unless you can’t stand the sight of it, but I’m telling you the property is worth something, at least. If the house is too far gone with bugs and rot you can pull it down and put up something you and Danny like better.’
‘It’s very generous of you, Aunt May. I just don’t like to hear you talk about dying.’
‘No? It doesn’t bother me. But if it disturbs you, then we’ll say no more about it. Shall I show you your room?’
Leading the way slowly up the stairs, leaning heavily on the banister and pausing often in her climb, May explained, ‘I don’t go upstairs anymore. I moved my bedroom downstairs because the climb was too much trouble.’
The second floor smelled strongly of sea-damp and mold.
‘This room has a nice view of the sea,’ May said. ‘I thought you might like it.’ She paused in the doorway, gesturing to Ellen to follow. ‘There are clean linens in the hall closet.’
Ellen looked into the room. It was sparely furnished with bed, dressing table, and straight-backed chair. The walls were an institutional green and without decoration. The mattress was bare, and there were no curtains at the French doors.
‘Don’t go out on the balcony – I’m afraid parts of it have quite rotted away,’ May cautioned.
‘I noticed,’ Ellen said.
‘Well, some parts go first, you know. I’ll leave you alone now, dear. I’m feeling a bit tired myself. Why don’t we both just nap until dinner time?’
Ellen looked at her aunt and felt her heart twist with sorrow at the weariness on that pale, wrinkled face. The small exertion of climbing upstairs had told on her. Her arms trembled slightly, and she looked grey with weariness.
Ellen hugged her. ‘Oh, Aunt May,’ she said softly. ‘I’m going to be a help to you, I promise. You just take it easy. I’ll look after you.’
May pulled away from her niece’s arms, nodding. ‘Yes, dear, it’s very nice to have you here. We welcome you.’ She turned and walked away down the hall.
Alone, Ellen suddenly realised her own exhaustion. She sank down on the bare mattress and surveyed her bleak little room, her mind a jumble of problems old and new.
She had never known her Aunt May well enough to become close to her – this sudden visit was a move born of desperation. Wanting to get away from her husband for a while, wanting to punish him for a recently discovered infidelity, she had cast about for a place she could escape to – a place she could afford, and a place where Danny would not be able to find her. Aunt May’s lonely house on the coast had seemed the best possibility for a week’s hiding. She had expected peace, boredom, regret – but she had never expected to find a dying woman. It was a whole new problem that almost cast her problems with Danny into insignificance.
Suddenly she felt very lonely. She wished Danny were with her, to comfort her. She wished she had not sworn to herself not to call him for at least a week.
But she would call her father, she decided. Should she warn him against telling Danny? She wasn’t sure – she hated letting her parents know her marriage was in trouble. Still, if Danny tried to find her by calling them, they would know something was wrong.
She’d call her father tonight. Definitely. He’d come out here to see his sister – he’d take charge, get her to a hospital, find a doctor with a miracle cure. She was certain of it.
But right now she was suddenly, paralyzingly tired. She stretched out on the bare mattress. She would get the sheets and make it up properly later, but right now she would just close her eyes, just close her eyes and rest for a moment . . .
It was dark when Ellen woke, and she was hungry.
She sat on the edge of the bed, feeling stiff and disoriented. The room was chilly and smelled of mildew. She wondered how long she had slept.
Nothing happened when she hit the light switch on the wall. So she groped her way out of the room and along the dark passage toward the dimly perceived stairs. The steps creaked loudly beneath her feet. She could see a light at the bottom of the stairs, from the kitchen.
‘Aunt May?’
The kitchen was empty, the light a fluorescent tube above the stove. Ellen had the feeling that she was not alone. Someone was watching. Yet when she turned, there was nothing behind her but the undisturbed darkness of the hall.
She listened for a moment to the creakings and moanings of the old house, and to the muffled sounds of sea and wind from outside. No human sound in all of that, yet the feeling persisted that if she listened hard enough, she would catch a voice . . .