Three Things About Elsie: A Richard and Judy Book Club Pick 2018. Joanna Cannon
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It was only in the muteness of his flat, where he wallpapered his evenings with tea and silence, and where the only song was the hum of a refrigerator, that Simon discovered just how loud the rest of the world could be.
I have never done anything remarkable. I’ve never climbed a mountain or won a medal. I’ve never stood on a stage and been listened to, or crossed a finishing line before anyone else. When I look back, I have led quite an ordinary life. I sometimes wonder what the point of me was. ‘Does God have a plan, and where does he see me fitting into it?’ I asked the vicar once. He came to Cherry Tree with his leaflets, handing them around and trying to persuade us all into being religious.
‘We each have a role to play, Miss Claybourne,’ he said. ‘Jesus loves everyone.’
‘I’m sure he does,’ I said. ‘But love isn’t enough, is it? You need to have some kind of purpose. I was wondering what mine might have been?’
I looked at him. I thought he might give me an interesting answer. Something comfortable and reassuring. But he just checked his watch and started talking to Mrs Honeyman about harvest festivals.
So even the vicar doesn’t know why I’m here.
Elsie says I shouldn’t dwell on things so much, but when you get to this age, it passes the time.
‘There has to be a reason, though, doesn’t there?’ I said to her once. ‘Or have I spent the last eighty-four years just sitting in the audience?’
‘Of course you haven’t been sitting in the audience. No one sits in the audience. Even the seats in a theatre are still a stage.’
I’ve no idea what she meant. Times like that I just nod, because it’s less time-consuming and it makes life easier for both of us. She just comes out with these things. Like the girl with the twisted ankle. I’m sure she makes half of it up. It makes you wonder, though. It makes you wonder if you did have a purpose, but it floated past you one day, and you just didn’t think to flag it down.
Lying here, there’s not really very much else to do except wonder. Of course, I’ve wondered about Ronnie more than anyone. He was right under Elsie’s nose in that potting shed, but she wasn’t having any of it. She was exactly the same, even when we were at school. She’d tell me to stop worrying, before I’d even given her all my evidence. Before she’d heard the full story. The only difference is, no one will ever hear the full story this time. I never thought it would come to this. You always think a secret will only be a secret for so long, that one day you will turn to someone else and say, ‘I’ve never told anyone this …’ and the secret will vanish and become something else. It’s only when you get to the end of your life, when you’re lying on a wipe-clean carpet with only yourself for company, you realise that you never did manage to find the right someone to tell.
‘Justin’s bringing his accordion this afternoon.’
She stood in the middle of my sitting room, although it’s too small to really warrant having a middle.
‘Perhaps next week,’ I said.
Miss Ambrose took a deep breath. ‘Just five minutes, Florence. We’ll walk over together.’
‘It won’t be worth taking my coat off.’
‘That’s fine,’ she said. ‘However you want to do it.’
‘His eyes are very close together.’
‘Pardon?’
‘Justin’s,’ I said. ‘It’s an indication of criminal tendencies. You can tell a lot by how far apart people’s eyes are. I read about it. In a magazine.’
I stared into her face.
‘Florence, I’m quite certain that Justin—’
‘And he doesn’t get any thinner, does he?’
‘Florence!’
Whilst she wound all her layers back on, my gaze travelled the room. The dining chairs were pushed tight against the table, and the newspaper was read and folded in the corner. The vase was in the middle of the sideboard. Perhaps slightly off-centre, looking at it. Perhaps just an inch to the left. The newspaper was in the right-hand corner. The vase was an inch to the left. Or was it the other way around?
‘I’ve changed my mind,’ I said. ‘I’m staying here. I’m busy.’
‘Florence. I thought we agreed?’
‘You did all the agreeing,’ I said. ‘I didn’t do any of it.’
‘Socialising is just as important as eating and drinking properly. You need to mix with people. If you don’t …’ Her sentence couldn’t find its ending.
‘If I don’t, what?’ I said.
She smiled a frown. ‘If you don’t, perhaps Greenbank really is the right decision for you.’
I closed my mouth as tightly as I could, because I was worried about what might fall out of it.
‘Ready?’ Miss Ambrose tucked her scarf inside her jacket.
I nodded.
The last thing I thought of, as she pulled the door to, was the elephant. Staring at the window. Waiting for me to get back.
I looked for him as soon as I walked in the room.
I went through all the faces. I did it more than once, because people kept moving around, and I was worried I’d miss somebody out. I even had a walk up and down. Once or twice, someone tried to speak to me, but I refused to involve myself, because if you’re not careful, you find yourself caught and you have to spend the next two hours sitting with someone and inventing things to say. In the end, I found a chair at the back on my own. I was given a cup of tea, that must have been Miss Ambrose, and I balanced the saucer on my knee.
The room started to fill with residents, with walking sticks and overcoats, and after a few minutes, there was a wall of conversation around me. I couldn’t tell what anyone was talking about, because they were all standing up and their voices wandered away, but every so often, a word would escape and find me. Gardening, I think. And the television. Perhaps the weather. I had used up my conversation on all these subjects a long time ago, and so I stayed in my seat and lived in the middle distance.
I’d been there a few minutes before I realised Elsie had sat next to me.
‘You came, then?’ she said. ‘After all?’
I held on to the saucer. ‘I didn’t have much choice. Miss Ambrose was in one of her moods. The kind where she doesn’t hear the word no.’
‘You’ll enjoy it, Florence. He’s very good, is Justin. He gets everyone singing. Even Mrs Honeyman.’
‘He won’t get me,’ I said. ‘He isn’t here yet, I’ve had a look.’
Elsie glanced across the room. ‘He’s over there, by the weeping fig. He’s just getting his accordion out.’
‘Not Justin.’ I looked around before I whispered, ‘Ronnie.’
Elsie shook her head. ‘I thought we had an agreement that there was no point in worrying until we could be certain.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘I didn’t agree with any of that. You made that agreement with yourself. How can you say we shouldn’t worry, when you saw him with your own set of eyes?’
‘Even if it is Ronnie, and it may very well just be someone who looks like him—’