Life_ An Exploded Diagram - Mal Peet [36]
I have a framed print of the Cotán painting here in my apartment. It hangs opposite the photograph of my young grandparents. I keep meaning to move it. Because when I look at it, I see Percy and Win reflected in the glass, hovering in the eternal darkness at the heart of the painting, just to the right of the apple — Sorry, quince.
EDMUND MORTIMER’S KIND and faulty heart finally gave out on a crisp October morning in 1960, a week after he’d presided over his forty-ninth Harvest Festival. (Which turned out to be the last Harvest Festival celebrated in the great Tithe Barn at Bratton Manor Farm. Gerard Mortimer did not share his father’s fondness for outmoded rustic customs, nor did he care for the expense involved.)
According to the old man’s wishes, his coffin was carried to the cemetery on one of the farm’s wooden carts, which happened to be the same age as himself. The cart was pulled by his last surviving pair of shire horses, Titan and Magnus, who were somberly but splendidly kitted out in gleaming black harness and plumes of black feathers. The route took them through Borstead’s market square, which was crowded with respectful onlookers and astonished children.
Inside the leading car of the funeral cortege, the atmosphere was prickly. Gerard Mortimer was embarrassed and deeply irritated. It was typical of his father to dictate that this occasion be turned into some sort of damned . . . parade. The horses, for God’s sake, as if he were royalty. All these people ogling them, the men taking their hats off and bowing their heads, the women wiping their noses with handkerchiefs. Ridiculous. Gerard’s wife, Nicole, had allowed herself to be carried away by it all. She’d started lifting her hand to the crowd like the queen mother until Gerard had reached across and seized her wrist. Françoise, his troublesome fourteen-year-old daughter, squirmed and pouted between them, as if wearing a black skirt and knee-socks was a form of cruel and unnatural punishment.
Gerard leaned back in the leather seat. It was all right; it would soon be over. Then he could start, at last. He’d been waiting one hell of a long time.
On the second Saturday after he’d stowed his father in the family crypt, Gerard Mortimer drove his dark-blue Humber into Ling’s yard. George greeted him.
“Morning, Mr. Mortimer. I’m sorry for your loss. We all thought very highly of your father. A real gentleman.”
“Yes. Yes, indeed. Thank you, George. How are you getting along with the Ferguson?”
“Well,” George said, “we . . .”
“Show me.”
Concealing his surprise — and his anxiety — George led Mortimer over to where the tractor stood semi-eviscerated in one of the lean-to workshops.
“The main problem is the oil pump —” George began, but Mortimer cut him off.
“I want to talk to you, George. Not about this piece of junk, and not here. What are you doing this afternoon?”
“Well, I . . . nothing much, I suppose.”
“Good. I’ll pick you up after you’ve had your lunch. Say, two thirty? Lovelace Road, isn’t it?”
George stood rubbing his graying chin stubble, watching Gerard depart. The man was a rum’n. Not a bit like his father. Harder. Impatient. Not a trace of the old man’s buttery Norfolk burr, either. Touch of a Yank accent. His men, behind his back, called him Zherrah, mimicking the way his wife pronounced his name. French, or French-Canadian, or whatever she was. Uppity posh foreign crumpet. What the hell did he want to talk about that couldn’t be said here?
George watched the big car pull smoothly away from the gates and wondered what he’d done wrong.
At a quarter to three, Ruth ducked away from the living-room window.
“He’s here,” she stage-whispered.
“Tuh,” Win muttered bitterly. If having Gerard Mortimer turn