The Memory Tree Read online

  Violet explained that, if I found it of interest, William wished to lend me the book. I said I should very much like to read it. We exchanged a few more pleasantries, then I set off back to the house, hugging the book with excitement.

  I went up to my room to study my new acquisition. The packet on which my name was inscribed had once held sweet pea seeds. Why this fact should seem worthy of recording, I do not know, except that I am very fond of sweet peas, both their colours and their scent. William Hatherwick cannot have known this, of course, but the coincidence pleases me. I shall keep this seed packet, together with the other one, inside my journal.

  September 3rd

  The de-population of Beechgrave continues. William Hatherwick has enlisted, along with several other staff. The tactical retreat following the Battle of Mons, where our heroic British Expeditionary Force was greatly outnumbered, has spurred many more men to enlist, as has the news that the German army is only thirty miles from Paris.

  I feel utterly useless. There must be something more I can do apart from knit socks and mittens for our soldiers! To distract myself, I have taken to walking in the wood most evenings, when it is fine. Yesterday I met a tearful Violet walking with her brother. Apparently Father has promised all the men that their jobs will be held open for them, so they are free to answer the call to arms. Mr Hatherwick Snr. will have to manage with the pot boys and the few garden staff who are left.

  William asked if I should like to borrow any of his books while he is away at the Front. He said Violet could bring them up to the house for me to peruse and that I should keep any that interested me ‘for the duration’. I thanked him for his kind offer and said I should be delighted to act as custodian of his library. He and Violet then set off back towards Garden Lodge. I was about to continue on my walk when William stopped and turned back. He indicated to Violet that she could go on ahead, then he hurried over towards me. He looked anxious, rotating the brim of his hat in his hands, as if possessed by some strong emotion. He cleared his throat, then said something very odd. I am still trying to digest its significance.

  He said, in the event of his failing to return, I should keep his books – all of them. Violet had no use for them and his father’s sight was beginning to fail, but William said he wanted to know his books would be read. I was taken aback and suggested a collection of fine books could be sold, but he shook his head. He then cast a glance over his shoulder at his sister who had ambled on ahead and said he wanted me to have the books because he knew I would appreciate them and because (this was the strange part I did not understand) he owned nothing else of value, save his pocket watch and he wanted to give that to Violet.

  I am sitting now at my writing table, surrounded by several piles of books that Violet kindly brought up to the house. I think she must have used the donkey cart to transport them! I have browsed through some of the books already, noting the places William has marked with old seed packets and I have read many of his neat marginal notes made in pencil.

  I feel as if I have been entrusted with a great treasure. Safeguarding such a collection is an honour and I am so very glad of the opportunity to study. It will, I am sure, prove an excellent distraction from the war and will prevent me from worrying excessively about the fate of our menfolk.

  I know Mother would not approve, but I have added William Hatherwick to my nightly prayers. He has been so very kind, I wish to pray for his safety, together with Walter’s and my brothers’. It is my fervent hope they will all return home safely.

  September 13th

  There is talk of the Kaiser suing for peace! But there have been so many rumours, I hardly dare hope this one is true.

  September 29th

  My diary has been much neglected of late. I write to Arthur, Eddie or Walter every day and by the time I have concocted something out of nothing by way of news, I am too low in spirits to record the tedium of my days. My brothers’ cheerful but infrequent letters describe their training, which consists of exercises to develop physical fitness, drill, marching, field craft and so on. It sounds dreary, but they seem to be enjoying themselves. Eddie in particular appears to think it all a great lark.

  I pray they remain in good spirits if they are eventually sent abroad. But surely the war cannot continue for much longer?

  October 10th

  It does not seem at all likely the war will be over by Christmas. Mr Kitchener has said it could last years.

  I am knitting furiously. Poor Mother can manage little more than winding wool into balls, but she likes me to sit with her while I knit. I wish I could describe the silence as ‘companionable’, but it is not. It is not even comfortable. Knitting gives one far too much time to think.

  October 21st

  Mother has lost her appetite and seems quite melancholy. After the postman has been, she has no interest in the rest of the day, nor does she follow the progress of the war. I think perhaps she is trying to ignore it.

  At times her mind seems to wander and she has started to play Beethoven again, from memory. I have not reminded her of what she said. Fortunately, Father does not recognise it as German music. Nor, I imagine, do the servants.

  November 15th

  Like Mother, I now live for letters, though Walter’s are so brief and inconsequential, they offer little food for thought. They are affectionate, however, if somewhat repetitive.

  While reading my last letter from Walter, I realised I can no longer recall what he looks like. I have a photographic portrait, but when I think of him and try to bring his face and person to mind, I see only his head and shoulders, as they appear in the portrait, floating like the Cheshire Cat’s grin. Try as I might, I cannot remember Walter himself. His photograph is not even a good likeness. Walter generally looks cheerful and often smiles. In this, the only picture I have of him, he looks stiff and uncomfortable, as if his collar is troubling him. That is not at all how I remember Walter.

  Though the truth is, I do not remember Walter.

  December 6th

  Scarborough, Whitby and Hartlepool have been bombarded by the German navy. There have been many casualties. Mother is hysterical, but I am too angry to be frightened.

  I have decided to abandon this wretched journal. It seems pointless to chronicle such a futile and unhappy life, especially as I have no right to be unhappy. After all, what sacrifices have I been called upon to make? Nothing more than postponing my wedding! In Hartlepool people have died horribly.

  This diary has become a repository for self-pity and cowardly thoughts. I am ashamed of it and ashamed of myself.

  I shall waste no more ink and paper.

  April 13th, 1915

  After an interval of several months, I take up my pen again. I can no longer bear to keep all my thoughts and feelings to myself, but there is no one to whom I can talk, so I have resumed this journal.

  I fear I shall go mad. So many men of our acquaintance have been wounded, are missing or known to be dead, that ordinary life has become impossible. I dread leaving the house in case I encounter someone I know who has been bereaved. I live in daily expectation of a telegram that will confirm my worst fears. Only letters and postcards from loved ones bring peace of mind – and that short-lived. Poor Charlotte’s family had a letter from Laurence after they had received the telegram to say he was dead. Imagine the agony, reading a letter from a dead man!

  I must try to order my thoughts. It would be all too easy to give in to despair, as Mother has done, but that would be unpatriotic. The writing of this journal must serve as a mental discipline. I shall record here the thoughts I cannot share with my brothers or Walter, or even my parents.

  May God forgive me if I commit unloving or disloyal words to paper.

  April 18th

  I am very concerned about Mother. She has become even more demanding, perhaps because she is unwell. She often asks me to read to her, but she will not listen to a newspaper. She prefers light novels and old letters from Arthur and Eddie, which I have read so m
any times, I now know them by heart.

  I have tried to rouse Mother from her lassitude by asking for help making up parcels for ‘the boys’, as we call them. They write that they need sundry provisions: books, candles, matches, soap, cakes, tins of milk and butter, etc. They have promised us more letters if we can supply them with writing paper and envelopes, which are in short supply.

  I have started to attend First Aid lectures and I continue to knit. My main recreation is reading, particularly William Hatherwick’s books. I have copied out many favourite passages into a notebook. I refuse to countenance the idea that these volumes might one day be mine. Our boys will return. All of them. The alternative is unthinkable.

  I keep myself occupied – frenetically so at times – so that when I retire, I fall asleep almost immediately. I have taken to going on long walks around the estate as Mother does not like me to go very far from her. The highlight of a long and mostly tedious day is my walk to the beech wood and back. On the way I make notes of what is happening in the garden. I am not sure why I do this, other than to have something to tell Violet Hatherwick when I see her, which I do most days. I believe she looks out for me now.

  Violet is in the habit of asking me, ‘What looks well in the garden today?’ and she includes my answers in letters to William. She says she is ‘not much of a letter writer’ and is glad of any news with which to supplement hers, so I have taken to giving her a piece of paper with my garden notes scribbled on it. I believe she copies them out for William.

  Evidently he enjoys hearing about Beechgrave’s gardens. Violet has several times read out excerpts from his letters in which he thanks me for sending a little piece of England to war-ravaged France. So when I walk through the garden – or the wood, which Violet says is one of William’s favourite places – I try to see what he would see, so that I (or rather Violet) can reassure him that, despite this cataclysmic war, life goes on. Things still grow, bloom and set seed.

  Thank God – oh, thank God! – for the dear bees.

  April 20th

  If only Walter wrote longer letters. He has even less to say on paper than he did in person. I struggle to reply because he tells me so little about his life at the Front. It is much easier to write to Arthur and Eddie who tell me about their friends, the parcels they receive, what it is like to be shelled for hours. They never complain, though Eddie said the horses have a very hard time of it. How typical of dear Eddie to consider the animals!

  Walter’s letters are all much the same: warm thanks for my last letter, a brief description of his state of health, enquiries after mine, concluding with fond regards for my parents and assurances that he is ‘as ever’, my ‘most devoted Walter’. Am I unreasonable to want to know more? He mentions that he reads, but not what he reads. He commends the courage of his fellow officers, but tells me nothing of what sort of men they are. He says the destruction in France is ‘indescribable’, but I do so wish he would try.

  I must be content. Walter’s letters tell me he is still alive. I cannot, must not ask for more.

  April 23rd

  I am too tired to write this evening. The keeping of this journal was once a pleasure, or at least a pastime, then it became an outlet for my overburdened emotions, but now I can hardly bear to live this life, let alone record it.

  But how dare I complain? I am warm and dry and I have plenty to eat. I even have a good supply of paper and envelopes. The same cannot be said for Walter and my poor brothers.

  I can hear Mother playing in the music room. Music is her great consolation, but now there are only the two of us, she insists I play Eddie’s violin to widen our repertoire. I feel uncomfortable doing so. I cannot explain why, except to say, I feel as if it tempts fate, to rehearse a future I hope will never come to pass.

  I must put a stop to this endless brooding! What is the point of recording so much sadness, anxiety and loneliness? I cannot imagine that my descendants – if I have any – will show any curiosity about my little life. Momentous things are happening beyond the English Channel, but here at Beechgrave life merely staggers on, a pale imitation of what it once was.

  The garden too. It is unkempt and neglected because so few staff remain and, as Mr Hatherwick our Head Gardener put it, ‘The abundance of work presses hard on the smallness of time.’ Nevertheless, our oaks have been felled. Father gave the order in response to an appeal from the Admiralty for donations of wood for shipbuilding.

  How I hate, hate, hate this war! And how hateful it is to be a woman in time of war. Mother refuses to let me look for any sort of voluntary work and claims she cannot spare me. Father is no more sympathetic. He says my duty is to look after Mother while he works long hours managing the saw mill and an estate crippled by a shortage of manpower.

  May 2nd

  Some good news at last. When I saw Violet today, she invited me into her little parlour to listen to the latest news from William. He has started to create a garden! He and some of the other men found some tulips and wallflowers in the ruined gardens of a French village that had been destroyed by shells. They dug them up and transplanted them to make a little garden behind a wall of sandbags. William had sent a charming little sketch. I had no idea he was such an accomplished artist, but Violet said he has filled many sketchbooks over the years.

  William has asked Violet to send him some seeds. I begged her to give me the list as I should like to buy the seeds myself and send them. She did so willingly.

  I shall venture into Bristol to find a seed merchant where I shall buy William all the seeds he needs, then I shall make up a parcel and enclose a little letter.

  I could weep with happiness to think that somewhere, someone is trying to grow something; that in the midst of unimaginable slaughter and destruction, something new will live!

  May 6th

  Arthur is dead. He was killed in action at Ypres.

  Father collapsed when he heard the news. Dr Maguire has told Mother we should prepare for the worst. She is beside herself with grief. I can hear her calling for me now, shrieking.

  Shall I have no leisure to mourn my dear, brave brother?

  May 7th

  Father is holding on. Mother seems convinced all will be well, but Dr Maguire is not optimistic. Neither am I, but I continue to pray for Father’s recovery.

  May 8th

  Father passed away this evening. I was at his bedside, but I spared him the news that Eddie has been wounded.

  Even if Eddie should survive, I fear Mother will not bear up. The balance of her mind is disturbed now and she is incapable of making arrangements for the funeral. Dr Maguire gave her something to make her sleep and when he left, a blessed silence descended, a silence in which I felt altogether numb. I have cried so many tears for Arthur, I am quite exhausted, but now Father is dead and I must mourn his loss too. If Eddie dies, I fear I shall go mad with grief, like Mother.

  When I was certain she was sound asleep, I went out and walked down to Garden Lodge. Violet opened the door to me and as soon as she saw me, she took me by the hand and led me into the little parlour where, to my surprise, I cried and cried. I was convinced I had no more tears left to shed.

  Violet asked no questions. She must have heard what had happened. Bad news travels fast these days, even though there is so much of it. She made tea and asked if I should like to hear more about William’s trench garden. I said I should, very much.

  As she read, I gazed about me, stunned with grief, and noticed for the first time how red Violet’s hands are. The skin was very dry and cracked in places. I suddenly remembered her brother’s square brown hands as he turned his cap nervously, speaking to me in the woods. The thought of him planting flowers with those hands in the mud of a foreign field furnished me with some queer sort of comfort.

  Violet’s hands shook a little as she read William’s letter. She is fearful, afraid she will lose him. Or perhaps there is someone else at the Front, a man who means even more to her than her brother. There is so much I should like to
know, but cannot ask. There is so much I should like to tell, but cannot say.

  When Violet had finished reading, I took her rough hand in mine and held it. We sat for a while, in silence, staring into the fire. Waiting.

  May 12th

  There is no news of Eddie, who is being cared for in a Belgian field hospital. I long to go and visit him but I doubt Mother would manage without me, nor can I readily ask her permission to travel since she does not acknowledge that Father and Arthur are dead, nor that Eddie is wounded. She is at least calm nowadays, unless I cross her. Calm, but unhinged. Her conversation is directed not towards me, but to her absent husband and sons. This is how Mother’s poor shattered mind copes with unspeakable loss: she does not speak of it.

  Instead she plays the music we all used to play together – trios, quartets, quintets – but she plays only the piano part, so the music makes little sense. I cannot bear it and refuse to enter the music room now, but occasionally I stand outside and listen. It is pitiful to hear her accompany music only she can hear. Sometimes she even stops to admonish Eddie for not keeping time, as if he were in the room.

  I have tried in earnest to pray for Eddie, but I am losing faith in the power of prayer and derive no comfort now from the exercise. I feel rather like Mother, talking to myself, rambling on irrationally, but there are days when I envy Mother the solace of her madness. Is that very wicked of me?

  May 16th

  My dear brother Edwin is dead. They say he did not suffer. I wish I could believe it. I have not told Mother yet. I dare not.

  No more.

  I have no more words.

  ANN

  Connor closed the journal slowly and said, ‘Poor Hester.’

  Phoebe blew her nose. ‘Very affecting. It’s extraordinary how involved you can get with people you’ve never met and never will. I mean, it’s not even fiction, it’s just a diary. But it really brings it home to you, doesn’t it? The personal cost of the war. Such a pointless war too.’