The Way We Were_ A Novel - Marcia Willett [1]
‘It belongs to my father.’ she replies reluctantly.
Her grandmother gives a cry of angry impatience. ‘Everything belongs to your father now. It's how your grandfather arranged it years ago, and I didn't give a thought to how it might be for you when he died. It never occurred to me that your mother would die soon afterwards, or that your father would remarry. I must be grateful that he allows me to stay here, I suppose. A custodian of his treasures, which will all go to his son by that Frenchwoman. At least take the Merlin. He's been standing on the shelf in the Red Room for years and nobody will miss him. Take it, Tegan.’
Always Tegan: never the little name ‘Tiggy’ that her friends use. She opens the passenger door and places the little figure – no more than six inches high – amongst the impedimenta on the seat: a rug, maps, some chocolate. Nestled in the warm folds of the rug, he stares forward, his profile as imperious and compelling as that of her grandmother. Tiggy settles him more firmly, shuts the door and takes the frail old woman in her arms.
‘Thank you,’ she says. ‘You'll look after yourself, won't you? I might not be able to get away for a bit.’
For a moment the old woman holds her tightly; then she kisses her granddaughter and stands back. She is not demonstrative and the need to give the Merlin, an impulsive but oddly necessary gesture, has taken her by surprise.
‘I'm glad you're going to Julia,’ she says. ‘Such a good friend. Give her my love.’
‘Of course I will. I'll let you know I've arrived safely but I might stop overnight on the way down so don't worry about me.’
‘I've long since given up worrying about my family,’ is the tart response. ‘Goodbye, darling.’
She turns abruptly, crossing the gravel and disappearing towards the house, leaving Tiggy to climb into the VW and set off down the drive. She's not hurt by that sudden departure: she knows quite well that they're both feeling churned up inside and that, though she would never show it, her grandmother is near to tears.
Has she guessed the truth? Tiggy shakes her head. Surely not. There has been no indication, no change in her grandmother's behaviour – except right at the end in the giving of the bronze: an uncharacteristic neediness that absolutely required that gift should be accepted, overwhelming Tiggy's own strong instinct to reject utterly anything that belongs to her father. And after all, she tries to persuade herself now, the Merlin might have been collected in the first place by her grandfather – the Red Room has always been full of beautiful and unusual pieces to which his son now continues to add – and this thought some-how makes it easier to accept one small object from among so many. Her grandfather, who had told her so many stories of Merlin and the court of King Arthur, would not have begrudged her this artefact from his collection. Odd that now, at the time of her greatest need, she should be travelling west. Julia lives a matter of miles from Tintagel.
‘Of course you must come to us,’ she said. ‘Oh, poor you. This is so awful. Losing Tom is bad enough but … Look, of course you must come down to Trescairn straight away… Pete? Pete won't mind a bit. He's going to sea next week for three months, so he'll be delighted that I shall have some company. Don't fuss, Tiggy just come whenever you're ready.’
Oswestry, Shrewsbury, Ludlow, Leominster: the miles are slowly eaten up beneath the trundling wheels. She stops on Wenlock Edge to make coffee, and to give the Turk a run, and again at Hereford to fill up with petrol. They have an early lunch in the winding Wye valley, beside the river, and all the while Tiggy is conscious of the wild bleak country to the west and north, stretching away to Snowdonia where Tom died four weeks earlier, attempting to complete the Horseshoe under snow. Snow still lies on the Black Mountains and the Brecon Beacons, and even here, deep in the valley, the wind is icy and the February sun is a chilly glimmer