And then the discordant notes, the A# and B. As they continued to sound and sound again, a rare tear would form and fall, flashing across her cheek. Dissonant but somehow right: sounding out what she felt.
She seemed to seek out the discord, as a finger finds a wound.
How many nights in August had he woken to the sound of piano music and crept downstairs to realise that she was weeping.The sobs were robbed from her. It was as if she was being hit in the stomach, again and again. Daniel remembered pulling himself into a ball as he listened, frightened for her, not understanding what was wrong, feeling unable to comfort her. He had been frightened to go into the room and face her like that. Already he had come to see her as strong, impervious – braver, harder than his own mother. As a child he could not fathom her sorrow. He never fully understood why. He had come to love her strong calves and muscular hands and loud, strong laugh. He couldn’t bear to see her broken, at a loss.
But in the morning, to be sure, she would be fine again. Two aspirin and an omelette after the chickens were fed; and it was over for another year. The next summer it would happen again. Her pain never seemed to lessen. Each year it would return with the same ferocity, like a perennial frost.
Daniel thought about it. Minnie must have died on 9 or 10 August. Was it the grief that had finally killed her?
He looked around the room. He was surprised to feel the weight of the house. The memories that it held leaned on him and brushed against him. He remembered both her tears and her laughter: the easy lilt of it that had once charmed him. Then he remembered again what she had done to him. Gone, but still he could not forgive her. Understanding her was something, but it was not enough.
Daniel closed the lid of the piano. He looked at Minnie’s chair, remembering the sight of her, sat with her feet up, telling stories with the light of the fire in her eyes and her cheeks pink with mirth. Beside the chair was an open box file. Daniel picked it up and sat down in Minnie’s chair to examine the contents. Newspaper clippings from the Brampton News and the Newcastle Evening Times fluttered into his lap like anxious moths.
A car crash involving a woman and two children resulted in the death of six-year-old Delia Flynn, from Brampton in Cumbria. The other child passenger sustained minor injuries but was released from hospital on Thursday evening. Delia was taken to Carlisle General Hospital where she died two days later from serious internal injuries.
The mother of the child, who was driving the car and who escaped with minor injuries, refused to comment.
There were two other articles on the car accident, and then another piece drew Daniel’s attention. It was partially torn and had been ripped from near the fold of the newspaper.
F
ARMER
F
OUND
D
EAD IN
P
OSSIBLE
S
UICIDE
A local man and Brampton farmer was found dead on Tuesday night following a shooting incident. An investigation is under way, but police are not treating the death as suspicious.
Daniel sat in silence in the cold living room. As a child he had tried to ask her about her family, but she would always change the subject. The rest of the box file was filled with paintings that Delia had done: finger paintings, leaf rubbings and mosaics of lentils and macaroni. Not knowing why, Daniel folded up the two newspaper clippings and slipped them into his back pocket.
It was cold, and he stamped his feet as he walked around. He picked up the telephone. The line was now dead. The answer-phone was flashing and he played the messages.
There was a breathy female voice that whispered, ‘Minnie, it’s Agnes. I heard you’re not able to come on Sunday. I just wanted to say I’m happy to take the stall. I hope you’re not feeling too bad. Talk t’you later, I think… ’
The machine moved to the next message:
‘Mrs Flynn, this is Dr Hargreaves. I hope you can call me back. I have the results from the consultant. You missed your last appointment. They certainly warrant discussion and I hope that you are able to reschedule. Thank you.’
End of messages, the machine proclaimed.
There were letters piled on the chair next to the telephone in the hall. Daniel flicked through them. There were red letters from the electricity board and the telephone company, letters from the RSPCA and PDSA, copies of Farmers Weekly. Daniel swept them to the floor and sat down, a hand covering his mouth.
The chill bone of the discordant notes sounded in his head. Dead. Dead. Dead.
Daniel was unable to stay the night in Minnie’s aching house. He found a room in a local hotel, where he ate a too-rare steak and drank a bottle of red wine. He fell asleep with his clothes on, on top of the nylon covers in a damp room that smelled as if someone had died in it. He had phoned Cunningham, Minnie’s lawyer, from the road. As he had expected, the funeral was to be held in the chapel of the crematorium on Crawhall.
It was a Tuesday. Brampton was cooler than London, the sun banished by cloud. Daniel could smell the trees in the air and the unyielding green of them was oppressive. It was too quiet and people seemed to turn to look when they heard his footsteps. He longed for the anonymity, urgency and noise of London.
The doors to the chapel were open when he arrived and he was shown inside. The hall was just over half-full. The mourners were men and women of Minnie’s age. Daniel sat near the back, in the middle of one of the empty pews. A tall, thin, balding man in grey approached him.
‘Are you … Danny?’ the man whispered, although the service had not begun.
Daniel nodded.
‘John Cunningham, pleased to meet you.’
His hand was dry and hard. Daniel felt his own damp with sweat.
‘I’m so glad you decided to come. Come forward. Makes it look better.’
Daniel wanted to hide at the back, but he got up and followed Cunningham to the front. Women he recognised from his childhood, farmers who had worked market stalls with Minnie, nodded at him as he sat down.
‘There’re no drinks or anything afterwards,’ Cunningham whispered in Daniel’s ear. His breath smelled of milky coffee. ‘But if you have time for a chat after … ?’
Daniel nodded once.
‘I’m going to say a few words for her. I wonder if you want to also? I can speak to the minister?’
‘You’re all right,’ said Daniel, turning away.
He sat through the short ceremony with his teeth pressed so hard together that the muscles in his right cheek began to ache. There were hymns and then the minister’s practised words of kindness in a rounded Carlisle accent. Daniel found himself staring at the coffin, still disbelieving that she was actually inside. He swallowed as the minister called on John Cunningham to deliver the eulogy.
At the podium, Minnie’s solicitor cleared his throat loudly and read from a folded piece of A4 paper.
‘I am proud to be one member of the gathering of people here today in honour of a wonderful woman who brightened up all of our lives and the lives of many more beyond these four walls. Minnie is an example to us all, and I hope she felt proud of everything she achieved in her life.
‘I got to know Minnie in a professional capacity after the tragic deaths of her husband and daughter, Norman Flynn and Cordelia Rae Flynn – may they rest in peace.’
Daniel sat up and took a deep breath. Cordelia Rae. He had never known her full name. The rare times that Minnie mentioned her, she was Delia.