Everything inside Matthew softened and let go, like when he held out his arms to Gran and she wrapped him in a hug so warm that their bodies melted together. He shut his eyes feeling the warmth jostle the shadows from the corners of the room and chase them down the long rafters of the ceiling. But it did not touch Miss Loyal Empire Woman, her coldness spread until it had filled the vacuum of Mr Werther’s departure.
‘We will have no German pictures here,’ she grated. ‘No German spies either. Take out your primers. Read the story of how Sir Francis Drake destroyed the Spanish Armada. Then draw a picture of that great battle. Sir Francis Drake was a loyal Englishman, not like some Hun-loving boys.’ Her eyes clawed Matthew’s face. ‘Some boys and their anarchist friends who sabotage our war effort on the waterfront.’
Gran needed help with the garden. Edward was coming and he was to lunch with them. Matthew’s happiness roared through him like one of the new motor cars, all red and glittering brass. Everything shone and shimmered, neither tired nor tarnished from the day before. Marigolds bordering the path were bright as shredded suns. The brilliant light hurt his eyes and he sought the sanctuary of shadows where mosses sucked the morning moisture.
Edward arrived at ten. He had attached a hessian bag to the crossbar of his bicycle and in it he had a present for each of them. For Matthew he brought Mark Twain’s Tom Sawyer, for Gran a collection of poems by Rabindrinath Tagore, and for Mother a small rosewood box inlaid with ivory and slivers of tinted wood. When Matthew looked at the design he saw that it was a picture of an Indian lady sitting on a rock while a deer calmly nibbled her fingers. Mother held it in both hands cupping the ends so that her fingertips would not smear the surface. Gently she lifted the lid. Inside was a serviette ring of scented wood carved into twists of leaves and flowers. It breathed out a sweetness of honey darkened by wood and sharpened by the astringency of herbs.
‘It’s sandalwood,’ his mother said. ‘From India.’ She ran her finger over the pattern on the box. ‘Does it have a story?’
‘The Indian hawker told me that it is Shakuntala sending a message to her lover through the deer.’
‘Oh,’ Margaret said. ‘Oh.’ And although her head was bent over her gift Matthew saw the back of her neck change from its usual creaminess to a faint pink.
‘It’s lovely, Edward.’ Gran’s firm appreciation routed the emotions scuffling around the room.
‘Lovely, Edward. Thank you,’ said his mother. ‘We didn’t expect presents, Matthew, did we? Today we are all going to be bally gardeners. And we’ll have a party, too.’
Matthew, responding to this sudden gaiety in his mother, snatched first at her hand and then at one of Edward’s, a link between them. He jumped up and down shouting: ‘Bally gardeners! Bally gardeners!’
They laughed together. Gran at the table placing a cloth over the fresh scones laughed too but there was a gap, like an echo, that takes its reality from something not its own. Edward said the lettuces needed manure so he and Matthew had better put on old togs and clean out the fowlyard.
‘And I must find some old togs, too. I shall be a farmer’s maid today in faded cotton skirt and bonnet. Come, Matthew, and help me choose,’ said his mother.
‘I’d rather go with Edward.’
She pouted. ‘But I need a man to advise me.’
‘I’m not a man and I’d like to go with Edward.’
‘Oh, very well. Nobody loves me.’ Her head drooped.
‘Yes, yes, I do. But …’
‘You’d rather go with Edward and abandon me?’
‘No … I … yes.’
‘Run along with Edward, Matthew.’ And as they closed the kitchen door he caught a word or two of Gran’s: ‘manipulative’, ‘unfair’. A door slammed from inside. He took Edward’s hand. ‘What does man-ip-ul-ative mean?’
‘Using other people for your own ends.’
Using. He used bits of wood to make his puppets, and kerosene tins so that he could walk through the reed beds. He used soap to wash and towels to dry himself. But to use people? It was impossible to use people. And ends. An end was the finish of something. Or was it?
‘What are ends?’
‘Things people want.’
‘Not finishes?’
‘Not always.’
‘Some ends go on then?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then how can they be finishes?’
‘You’ll be a lawyer for sure, Matthew.’
‘Why?’
‘You question like one.’
‘Don’t you like me questioning?’
‘Yes, of course I do,’ he ruffled Matthew’s hair.
‘Gran does but Mother doesn’t.’
‘That would be right.’
‘Do you like Mother?’ Matthew saw again the pink on her neck and behind her ears and heard her say ‘Oh’.
‘Yes, I like your mother.’
‘More than Gran?’
‘Differently.’
‘More than me?’
‘Differently.’
‘Can you love people the same and differently?’
‘Didn’t I say you’d be a lawyer?’
‘Yes. But can you?’
‘Yes, you can. Everyone does when they have a family and friends.’
‘Mr Werther said musicians like Mr Schubert are loved even when they are dead.’
‘Who’s Mr Werther?’
‘Our headmaster.’
‘A German?’
‘Yes. I think so.’
‘Poor fellow.’
‘How did you know, Edward, that he was a poor fellow?’
‘Most Germans who live here these days are poor fellows.’
‘Edward?’
‘Mmm … mm.’
‘Some boys are unkind to Mr Werther.’
‘Are they now?’
‘They hide behind the fence and throw things at him when he passes and call him “Fat Fritz”. I take his hand and walk with him but sometimes I’m afraid.’
‘You do that, Matthew?’
He nodded.
‘That’s a pretty brave thing to do.’
‘He told us about Schubert being lonely and only having his Schubertianer to help him. Last time I wanted him to cross the road. The fence there is low and the boys can’t hide but he wouldn’t. He said I should run off home to my gran but I walked to the end of the house with the wall.’
‘I see. And when do these boys torment him?’
‘After
