Voice from the past

The bitter, winter wind swept across the city cemetery. Its icy fingers embraced the granite angels clad in velvet cloaks of moss offering a pitiable protection against the elements. Stone arms lay strewn in the grass as the weeds swathed themselves around the hems of their marble frocks. Their unseeing eyes watched as Cathy shivered pulling her coat further around her with one hand, using her other to pull her thick woollen hat further over her head. Her pace quickened as she headed past these once majestic monuments that time had forgotten. The hairs on her neck suddenly itched. She told herself not to be silly and shook herself free of the fear that momentarily gripped her. Striding towards the newer section she hadn’t noticed the one pair of seeing eyes that followed her.

Cathy had been visiting the grave every week for the last two years. Her friends thought her mad.

“He’s a stranger who died sixty years ago,” they said, sarcastically.

“Not to me he isn’t. I know his name. Without him I wouldn’t be here.” That was all she needed to know. In the end she ignored them, they didn’t understand. After awhile they stopped their teasing, simply shaking their heads as they watched her cross the road to the florists for the posy she would lay on the unknown mans grave.

The wind moaned as she arrived at his grave for one last visit. There was no headstone, just a brick surround that had seen better days. A mottled stone vase bore the inscription ‘Dearest Husband’, its letters fading along with the memory of the man that slept below. Cathy didn’t need a headstone to remind her that this was Alfred Benson who had died in 1937, leaving a young wife and three sons, one of whom had been her father. It had been Elsie’s weekly outing; a bus ride into town buying her posy from the same florists that Cathy now frequented. Elsie’s health had deteriorated and she was now a resident in ‘Greenacres’. Cathy had always been close to her grandmother, so she took over her weekly visits. This was to be her last visit as her grandmother had died just a few weeks previously, leaving her a cottage somewhere in the north of Scotland in a place that Cathy had never heard of or even pronounce. It was a cottage that her grandmother use to visit for summer holidays and the odd weekend as a young woman. In her last few years Elsie had never spoken about it and it was commonly thought that it’d been sold.

“Goodbye,” she murmured placing her posy in the stone urn, a waft of deep aromatic tobacco filled the air.

Startled, she looked up. A pallid faced man stood close by.. He was smartly dressed in tan slacks, a chequered sports jacket with a matching peaked cap perched unsteadily on his head. In his hand he held a rather elegant pipe with little wisps of smoke blending with the chilly air.

“Aren’t you cold?” she spoke the first words that entered her head.

“No, I’ve known colder places, hotter ones too,” he said softly, his voice fading away into the air.

“I hope I didn’t sound rude.”

“Not at all. A relative?” he nodded towards the grave.

“Yes, my grandfather,” she surprised herself as this was the first time shed referred to Alfred as her grandfather. Until then he’d always been ‘Nanna’s husband’.

“You must miss him,” the stranger asked.

“I never knew him. He died years before I was born. It was rather sad. He died in an industrial accident in the factory where he worked. He left my grandmother alone with three young sons. My dad was the eldest. He died five years ago. Now my grandmother is dead. This is my last visit. Nanna left me a cottage in Scotland and I’m going to live there. I came to say goodbye.”

She wiped away the stray tears that were just creeping onto her cheeks. She didn’t know why she was telling this stranger her life story other than she felt the need to talk. He radiated a sense of comfort.

“No other family?” he probed gently.

“No, I’ve no brothers or sisters. My mother died when I was small,” she answered sadly.

“Your father’s brothers; what happened to them?”
“I don’t know. Some sort of quarrel that was never spoken about. They never come here.” she answered quietly as the wind sucked her words into the freezing atmosphere.

“It happens,” he said simply.

She bent to pick up her gloves and bag. Turning back to bid farewell to her new friend, she saw he was no longer there.

“Perhaps he doesn’t like goodbyes either,” she spoke softly to the nameless grave, as she shook the slivers of grass from her coat. As she turned away she murmured “I’ll think of you often.” She shivered as she thought she heard a whispered ‘thank you’. Shaking her head, she headed towards the cemetery gates.

Some weeks later, having put her affairs in order, she set off to start her new life in Scotland. A long train journey, two buses and a taxi found her at the gate of ‘Wisteria Cottage’. Set by itself, the tiny, grey stone cottage with its rusty colour tiled roof stood in a garden knee high in grass amid which flourished an array of multi coloured wild flowers. The rickety gate yielded to her touch and she walked along the unevenly paved path to the door whose once bright yellow paint was flaking away to reveal faded burgundy wooden panels. Cathy fingered the wisteria blooms around the door.

“Welcome,” a deep, rich mans voice said.

She’d not seen anyone as she’d entered the garden. She shivered as her eyes searched for the speaker, not finding him. Realising that she was alone, she cursed her vivid imagination.

“It’ll be the death of me,” she murmured unlocking the creaking door.

It was as if she’d stepped back in time. Smiling, Cathy explored her new home. She fingered the furnishings in the small kitchen, sitting room, bedroom and bathroom tucked away at the back. She felt that this had been a home that had once oozed love.

Desperate for a cup of coffee, she filled the kettle and lit the gas. She was thankful she’d stopped at the village shop for a few essentials. Waiting for the kettle to boil she browsed through the dusty cupboards. Tucked into a corner was a photo album that had seen better days. Coffee made, she sat at the kitchen table turning the yellowing pages. There was her grandmother as a young woman. Then, for the first time she looked at the face of her grandfather, Nanna’s husband. He was a pallid faced, smartly dressed man in tan slacks, a chequered sports jacket with a matching peaked cap perched precariously on his head. In his hand he held a rather elegant pipe. A waft of rich tobacco smoke filled the air and mingled with the equally rich aroma of her recently brewed coffee.

Instinctively she knew that she’d come home and that he would look after her.