The Insistent Garden Read Free Page A

across the frame. Delicate and freshly spun, it could not be left.
    I hurried down the stairs and returned with a broom. It was heavier than I expected and the handle swayed as the bristles swished around the corners of the hatch. I swung it round and gripped the head — ignoring the bristles scratching my fingers — and knocked. Just once. Empty space reverberated back. I knocked again and then began to pace, up and down the landing, tapping out the dimensions of the room above. And all the time I listened — only with half an ear — but listened still for the sound of a key turning in the front door and coat hangers knocking their shoulders together in the cupboard under the stairs. But it was early yet. I continued knocking, stretching out my arms and standing up on my toes, pausing only to rub dust out of my eyes and catch a cough in the palm of my hand, and all the time feeling pleasure in the method, in the measuring of something unknown. But it was not too early yet. The tapping had distracted me and it was not until a shadow fell on my arm that I realized my father was standing behind me. “What are you doing?”
    His eyebrows were disheveled, the ragged brow of a man both fading and thickening.
    â€œSweeping the ceiling.” I said.
    He looked up. “Why?”
    Hold his gaze. Hold his gaze and tell the truth. “I saw. . . a spider’s web.” I pulled a roll of grey web off the end of the broom and held it out to him. It stuck to my palm.
    â€œWhy were you knocking?”
    â€œI was just wondering what was up there.”
    â€œThere’s nothing up there.”
    The back of his neck looked prominent as he turned and walked towards the stairs: the high hairline, the white skin exposed above his collar and for a second, less than a second, I wanted to slap it, see if it went red. But my hand remained quietly by my side.
    The landing was quiet after he’d gone into his room, just the sigh of the bedsprings and the gentle rattle of the letterbox as a breeze crept into the hall. My thoughts returned to the attic. The room filled with nothing. Was his attic filled with nothing too? I’d never dared imagine the room at the top of my neighbour’s house, but the view, it would be good from up there.
    I tightened my cardigan across my chest, picked up the broom, hurried downstairs and slipped it back into the cupboard.

    34 Ethrington Street
Billingsford,
Northamptonshire
    July 24th 1968
    Dear Gillian,
    I’m here at last. ‘Best street in Billingsford’ the estate agent said but now I’ve got here it seems a bit of a dump. There was dog mess on my doorstep when I arrived and would you believe it, I was out of bleach. Got my own shop for the first time in my life and I’ve got no bleach. I’ve carried all my stuff upstairs into the flat but it’s chilly up there, one of those places that are cold even in summer, so I’ve got my heater unpacked and I’ll plug in the electric blanket after I’ve had my supper if it hasn’t warmed up.
    The shop isn’t as big as I remembered it but there’s a cosy room at the back for kicking off my shoes when it all gets too much and who knows, if it all goes well, I might be able to build an extension one day and then really start living the life. At least I’ve got big shop windows, lots of room to display my goods and best of all I can see my customers coming. I’ve met a neighbour already. Chubby woman from over the road, she just couldn’t resist turning up for a look before I’d even got the open sign turned round. I think she was in the middle of her dinner — you should’ve seen her laugh — all tonsils and tapioca. But customers are customers and I must try my best to be nice, mustn’t I. Archie popped in to see me too. Do you remember him? A friend of my Raymond’s from long ago. He’s got older since I last set eyes on him (haven’t