The Distant Hours

‘No.’

‘They hadn’t even got married, for that matter.’

‘No, but I didn’t know that then. I didn’t realize until you told me. All I knew was that I never heard from either one of them again. I’d sent something to Juniper, you see, something very important to me, and I was waiting to hear back from her. I waited and waited and checked the post twice every day, but nothing came.’

‘Did you write back to her? To find out why, to check that she’d received it?’

‘I almost did a number of times but it seemed so needy. Then I bumped into one of Mr Cavill’s sisters at the grocery shop and she told me that he’d run off to get married without telling any of them.’

‘Oh, Mum. I’m sorry.’

She set her book down on the quilt beside her and said, softly, ‘I hated them both after that. I was so hurt. Rejection is a cancer, Edie. It eats away at a person.’ I shifted closer and took her hand in mine; she held on tightly. There were tears on her cheeks. ‘I hated her and I loved her and it hurt so very deeply.’ She reached into the pocket of her dressing gown and handed me an envelope. ‘And then this. Fifty years later.’

It was Juniper’s lost letter. I took it from Mum, unable to speak, uncertain whether she meant for me to read it. I met her eyes and she nodded slightly.

Fingers trembling, I opened it and began.

Dearest Merry,

My clever, clever chicken! Your story arrived safely and soundly and I wept when I read it. What a beautiful, beautiful piece! Joyous and terribly sad, and oh! so beautifully observed. What a clever young Miss you are! There is such honesty in your writing, Merry; a truthfulness to which many aspire, but which few attain. You must keep on; there is no reason why you shouldn’t do exactly what you wish with your life. There is nothing holding you back, my little friend.

I would love to have been able to tell you this in person, to hand your manuscript back to you beneath the tree in the park, the one with the little diamonds of sunlight caught within its leaves, but I’m sorry to say that I won’t be back in London as I thought. Not for a time, at any rate. Things here have not worked out as I’d imagined. I can’t say too much, only that something has happened and it’s best for me to stay at home for now. I miss you, Merry. You were my first and only friend, did I ever tell you that? I think often of our time here together, especially that afternoon on the roof – do you remember? You’d only been with us a few days and hadn’t yet told me you were frightened of heights. You asked me what I was frightened of and I told you. I’d never spoken of it to anyone else.

Goodbye, little chicken,

Much love always,

Juniper x

I read it again, I had to, tracing the scratchy, cursive handwriting with my eyes. There was so much within the letter that made me curious, but one thing in particular to which my focus returned. Mum had shown it to me so I’d understand about Juniper, about their friendship, but all I could think of was Mum and me. My whole adult life had been spent happily immersed in the world of writers and their manuscripts: I’d brought countless anecdotes home to the dinner table even though I knew they were falling on deaf ears and I’d presumed myself since childhood an aberration. Not once had Mum even hinted that she’d harboured literary aspirations of her own. Rita had said as much, of course, but until that moment, with Juniper’s letter in hand and my mother watching me nervously, I don’t think I’d fully believed her. I handed the letter back to Mum, swallowing the clot of aggrievement that had settled in my throat. ‘You sent her a manuscript? Something you’d written?’

‘It was a childish fancy, something I grew out of.’

But I could tell by the way she wouldn’t meet my eyes that it had been far more than that. I wanted to press harder, to ask if she ever wrote now, if she still had any of her work, if she’d ever show it to me. But I didn’t. She was gazing at the letter again, her expression so sad that I couldn’t. I said instead, ‘You were good friends.’

‘Yes.’

My first and only friend, I loved her, Mum had said, Juniper had written. And yet they’d parted in 1941 and never made contact again. I thought carefully before saying, ‘What does Juniper mean, Mum? What do you think she means when she says that something happened?’

Mum smoothed the letter. ‘I expect she means that Thomas ran off with another woman. You’re the one who told me that.’

Which was true, but only because that’s what I’d thought at the time. I didn’t think it any more, not after speaking with Theo Cavill. ‘What about that bit at the end,’ I said, ‘about being frightened? What does she mean there?’

‘That is a bit odd,’ Mum agreed. ‘I suppose she was remembering that conversation as an instance of our friendship. We spent so much time together, did so many things – I’m not sure why she’d mention that especially.’ She looked up at me and I could tell that her puzzlement was genuine. ‘Juniper was an intrepid sort of person; it didn’t occur to her to fear the things that other people do. The only thing that scared her was some notion she had that she’d turn out like her father.’

‘Like Raymond Blythe? In what way?’

‘She never told me, not exactly. He was a confused old gentleman, and a writer, as was she – but he used to believe that his characters had come to life and were going to come after him. I ran into him once, by mistake. I took a wrong turn and wound up near his tower – he was rather terrifying. Perhaps that’s what she meant.’

It was certainly possible; I cast my mind back to my visit to Milderhurst village and the stories I’d been told about Juniper. The lost time that she couldn’t account for later. Watching her father lose his mind in old age must have been particularly scary for a girl who suffered her own episodes. As it turned out, she’d been right to be afraid.

Mum sighed and ruffled her hair with one hand. ‘I’ve made a mess of everything. Juniper, Thomas – now you’re looking at the letting pages because of me.’

‘Now that’s not true,’ I smiled. ‘I’m looking at the letting pages because I’m thirty years old and I can’t stay at home forever, no matter how much better the tea tastes when you make it.’

She smiled too then, and I felt a tug of deep affection, a stirring sensation of something profound that had been sleeping for a very long time.

‘And I’m the one who made a mess. I shouldn’t have read your letters. Can you forgive me?’

‘You don’t need to ask.’

‘I just wanted to know you better, Mum.’

She brushed my hand with a feather-light touch and I knew she understood. ‘I can hear your stomach grumbling from here, Edie,’ was all she said. ‘Come down to the kitchen and I’ll make you something nice to eat.’

An Invitation and a New Edition

And right when I was puzzling over what had gone on between Thomas and Juniper and whether I’d ever have the chance to find out, something completely unexpected happened. It was Wednesday lunchtime and Herbert and I were returning with Jess from our constitutional around Kensington Gardens. Returning with a lot more fuss than that description suggests, mind you: Jess doesn’t like to walk and she has no difficulty making her feelings known, registering protest by stopping every fifty feet or so to snout about in the gutters, chasing one mysterious odour after another.

Herbert and I were cooling our heels during one such fossicking session, when he said, ‘And how’s life on the home front?’

‘Beginning to thaw, actually.’ I proceeded to give him the summary version of recent events. ‘I don’t want to speak too soon, but I believe we might’ve reached a new and brighter dawn.’

‘Are your plans to move on hold, then?’ He steered Jess away from a patch of suspiciously odorous mud.

‘Lord, no. My dad’s been making noises about buying me a personalized robe and putting a third hook in the bathroom once he’s able. I fear if I don’t make the break soon, I’ll be lost forever.’

‘Sounds dire. Anything in the letting pages?’

‘Loads. I’m just going to need to hit my boss for a significant pay rise to afford them.’