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  I put the phone away. There are voices from upfront in the carriage, a couple of families out for the day. Toddler chatter. A baby whining, on the verge of some need it hasn’t words to express. Train journeys tumble in my mind. Playing noughts and crosses and hangman with you at a table we felt lucky to have found. That time we nearly missed the stop for the airport on our way to Disneyland Paris – you, Mummy, your sister, and me – me pulling the cord to halt the train just before it left the station, buying us time to get off, that inspector furious that I’d abused the alarm, me thinking it was worth it so as not to have missed our flight. These things happen. Days and weeks go by for me, you tucked away in your box, me living the life I have now for myself. Then a random sight, an inconsequential bit of music, and I’m ambushed. They’re like crowbars, jemmying the lid off, splintering the wood, unleashing memories and the loss of you.

  Enough of this. I get my phone again and send you a text, telling you I’m on my way, reminding you where the watching-the-world-go-by wall is, and saying I hope to see you there at three. Lots of love, Daddy.

  Lots of love, Daddy.

  ❦

  Come on, let’s do this.

  I feel a sudden up-rush, I’m sucked out of my body, slooped through an air vent and out into the sky. The train whips past below. I catch one glimpse of myself behind the glass, sitting woodenly, staring out of the window, mobile in hand, eyes no longer registering. A hollowed out shell.

  We have to be quick about it. I have to be back before a ticket inspector comes.

  An incredible surge of speed. I’m going faster than sound, now, though nowhere near the speed of light. I do a couple of barrel rolls, testing my manoeuvrability. It’s exhilarating, this abrupt freedom, this ability to be. The air roars furiously, a thunderous noise, as though outraged by my flight. My whole being is vibrating, I’m in sensurround, alive to possibility, my perceptions sharpened to crystal clarity.

  Just for a moment, my euphoria dims: I’m alone in the sky. Perhaps it was too much after all; it was foolish to think you might be ready. But then, a thousand feet below, I catch sight of you, a shimmering vapour trail, forging a parallel course. Current thrills through me; you have decided to come. Of course you feel reticent – you have no idea how to approach me. Seven years you’ve lived with me as the enemy. It would be a big step for anyone to take, to bridge that gulf, let alone you.

  I change trajectory by thought alone. Close on you in a graceful arc. Then we’re alongside each other. I can sense your uncertainty; there’s something reserved about your velocity, even though we’re going at the same speed. I have to be careful, what nascent trust there may be is as fragile as a soapy bubble. I dive beneath you, loop round the far side, spin myself playfully back over the top, finishing up, in relative terms, where I started. I’m not showing off. My aerial acrobatics are intended to amuse. Distract. Reassure. Then it hits me, as it so often hits me: you are no longer the child still alive in my memory. You are twenty-one-year-old you. The larking, the clowning about – all the stuff that once-upon-a-time you so loved. Chances are that these now embarrass, even repel. How to relate to the you who for one third of your life I haven’t known. I try to tune in, try to sense your mood. Still you’re uneasy. I think I understand that. It was never going to be any other way, not really. But you have come. At least you have come.

  We cross the Gloucestershire-Worcestershire border, coruscating streaks in the crisp blue October sky. Beneath us the verdant green of rural England cedes ground to the sooty sprawl of Birmingham and the Black Country. On over Staffordshire, the terrain becoming hillier as we approach the peaks of Derbyshire and our first destination. We’re racing to the origins – every tale has somewhere to begin. Only this story has no single start. This is the story of you, her, them, and me, and it has multiple points of entry. And even these are just waymarks on paths that trace back through the generations. They stretch so far they have curved over the very edge of the world and are beyond what we can ever see.

  If I were painting this, they would be present simultaneously, all these single start points, juxtaposed in a jumbled montage. Your eyes could rove at will, taking it all in. But pictures are susceptible to interpretation, their meaning is never clear. I have to use words, ponderous and slow and linear as they are. Even though words themselves are not exactly value-free.

  Here we are. I pull up short. You slow to a halt a hundred yards beyond. We hover, briefly, mindful of each other. You maintain your distance. Trust will take time to build.

  Follow me then, down among those drystone-wall-ribbed hills. Can you see our destination? That ramshackle farmhouse? The antiquated Ford tractor – bucket seat, no cab, tiny cowl; more of an engine on wheels – parked in its flagged yard. Only it’s not antiquated, that tractor, not at this point in time. Not so many years from when we are now, all the harrowing, ploughing, and mowing here were done by horse; the muck-spreading, hedge cutting, and ditch maintenance, all done by hand. But the war that has recently raged to its conclusion on the continent – the VE Day celebrations are still fresh in everyone’s minds – that war drained the tied cottages of their legions of agricultural labourers. Even the famous Land Army had its work cut out. The lack of person-power spurred great leaps in engineering. What you’re looking at, that blood-red Ford 9N tractor, at this moment that is the last word in modern farm machinery.

  There. Do you see him? Coming out from the milking shed. Knobbled knees below short trousers, V-neck pullover worn threadbare at the elbows. Some kind of hoop, he’s rolling it along the ground, flicking it along with a stick, seeing how far he can make it go before a clod of earth or a pat of cow shit causes it to fall. You have no idea who it could be. You have never met him in your life. All these years you have believed him to be dead. That is Ted. That boy there, that is the child who will one day become Mummy’s father.

  He has tousled short back and sides. Sticky out ears. Front teeth that are splayed like subsided tombstones. Even at this distance, you can see his nails are grubby. He doesn’t look much cared for.

  Round the stone water trough he goes. You admire his skill with the hoop, he can even get it to turn rudimentary corners, provided he tweaks it just right. He looks serious, inquisitive, like an investigator, pushing the boundaries of what this simple toy can be made to do. Does he have much else to play with? There’s nothing that looks remotely child-friendly anywhere in the yard. We haven’t time to see, but you should know he has an older brother, Nigel, who is currently experiencing a growth spurt. Nigel is with their mother in Matlock, being kitted out with new bits of uniform for the coming year at school. But when they are together, Ted and Nigel, that hay barn there is their kingdom – the high-piled oblong bales become their castle; random sticks serve as arrows and swords with which to repel imaginary invading hordes.

  There, did you hear it? That noise. Ted did. He stands stock-still, his hoop trundling away unperturbed across the yard. A sudden crump. Loud, but muffled in its quality. You listen carefully, as your child-grandfather does, too. The lowing of distant cattle. Skylarks, distracting predators from their nests. The drawn-out rattle of Ted’s hoop as it finally runs out of steam, and settles on the flagstones like a spun coin.

  Follow him, along the snicket between the stone barns, where the air feels damp and cool, into the front garden of the farmhouse with its tulips and dahlias and marigolds neat in the regimented beds. He’s heading in the direction from which that unexplained sound seemed to emanate. I want you to brace yourself; this is not something you are going to want to see.

  In through the front door, sticking close behind Ted’s pre-pubescent shoulders, narrow and sloped as a wire coat hanger. Left to the parlour. Empty. Right to the dining room. Likewise. Down to the kitchen, its range pumping stifling heat even though it’s summer, drab cotton underclothes drying on the hanging jenny. Deserted.

  You hesitate as you see him approach the nex
t door. Don’t worry, there’s no modesty to be preserved: the downstairs privy is in an outhouse round the back. That door, with its iron latch, its motley collection of different-width planks, that door leads to the room his father – your great-grandad – uses for an office. Where the paperwork for the running of the farm is held, together with the cash box, and a host of other private things.

  Ted pauses for a moment. He’s listening. The office is out of bounds; there’ll be hell to pay if he’s caught in there. The last thing he wants is to step in and find his old man, sat behind his wooden desk right in the centre of the room. But there is nothing but silence. Silence, and a peculiar sharp smell. His father must be up at Crams Land or Bugley Meadow, checking on the sheep. Ted pushes open the door.

  I’m sorry, I didn’t realise quite how messy it would be. From the front, Ted’s father doesn’t look so bad, sagged in his chair but wedged in place, the shotgun like a massive peace pipe in his mouth, his arms extended where they’d been holding the stock, the butt of which is jammed against the edge of the desk. His eyes are still open. Imagine that: he didn’t close his eyes. He stares sightlessly at Ted, his younger son, as though aghast at this intrusion into his private space.

  The back of his head is spattered in a wide crescent across the far wall. I had no idea the blood would still be sliding down, these few minutes later. Bits of hair, matted black. Lumps of stuff that looks like offal, but must be scalp and skull and brain.

  Let’s get out of here. Sucked back across the kitchen, down the hallway, out into the garden. All the while, Ted is motionless, as though locked in a staring competition with his dead dad, trying not to be the first to blink. I know, you want to do something to help him, that little boy stood rooted to the spot, his mind like a derailed chain, suddenly unable to turn any thoughts in the face of that terrible tableau. But there is nothing you can do.

  Come on, we must hurry. My train is belting across Wiltshire this very minute, and we’ve other places to go. That’s all I wanted you to see. I’m sorry it was so unpleasant; I’m sorry if it shocked you – though even as I think that I remind myself you are no longer a child; you are twenty-one-year-old you. Doubtless you’ll have seen far worse in films. Whatever, it was necessary – so you have the tiniest inkling of the impact on that ten-year-old boy. We’ve no time to hang around, no time to see what he did – whether he went to his father’s buckshot-blasted body, or whether he hurriedly pulled the office door shut and retreated to his hay kingdom where he would curl up like a foetus among the sweet-smelling dried grass and remain for hours and hours even after his mother and brother finally returned home and the police cars came to strew the yard. Still less have we time to see Ted’s story unfolding – being sent to live with a succession of grudging relatives, his mother deciding she could manage only the one child, now that the lease had to be given up and the farm become a memory. And that one child would be Nigel. No, we’ve got to leave him to get on with it, little Ted, as best he can. We’ll see him again, though; there’ll be time enough to catch up. And remember, this is just a waymarker – we’ll never see the family story, the relationship traumas, the crowding defeats that culminated in that tryst with that dismal twelve-bore. Those are paths that stretch way off over the edge of the world, to places we will never go.

  We’re flying again, heading further north on our whistle stop tour. Is it respect for the dead? Sombreness for that little boy? Whatever, your speed is subsonic, your trail no longer scintillating. Our mood is sober; I know better than to try barrel-rolls to lighten it. You need to process, register, reflect on what you saw. I tuck in close, leaving a bit of distance, and parallel along.

  South Yorkshire, West Yorkshire, on over North Yorkshire, overflying millions of our fellow citizens and the dramas and drudgeries of their lives. The air is cooler up here, the temperature falling as we cross the latitudes. Beyond the ribbon of the A1 I start to lose altitude, check that you are descending, too. The huddled settlements of Helmsley, Kirkbymoorside, flashing past beneath. My heart fills with love for you – your gritty pluck. You always were fiercely determined, would push yourself for hours on play equipment till you’d perfected the gymnastic manoeuvre you so wanted to do. Blistered raw hands, no matter – the goal was the thing. Come on, let’s see this through.

  Here we are, somewhere near Pickering. A perfectly ordinary merchant’s house, double-fronted, slate roof, big blocks of grey stone. A house that says: we’re prosperous. It even has coach lights either side of the porch, countering the day’s-end gloom.

  It’s a squeeze, but we make it through the red-glossed front door – me squishing somehow through the brass letterbox; you, with your lithe youth, funnelling though the keyhole. Ah, that’s better. It’s warm inside, even here in the hall. We slide noiselessly along the dado rail, the Lincrusta wallpaper bumpily textured against us, and enter the drawing room.

  An altogether cosier scene. Soft lamplight, a blazing coal fire in the grate, a Bakelite wireless warbling quietly to itself in the corner. A man, his wife, and their only daughter, are ranged round an occasional table, intent on their game. It’s a brand new one, fresh from the factory, one of many gifts this girl was given for her recent birthday. It takes a moment to realise – the board is strikingly plain, the colours subdued to our modern taste – but the revolver, rope, and candlestick are giveaways, so the simple coloured pieces must represent Miss Scarlet, Professor Plum, Reverend Green. You had no idea Cluedo was this old, but it is – one of many new diversions for the middle classes as they adjust to the gradual easing of rationing, and the idea that life can be fun again.

  The girl is excited. Her strawberry blonde curls jiggle as she bounces on her chair. I should tell you her name is Gloria. You peer over her shoulder to steal a glimpse of the Detective’s Notes pad clutched on her lap. Not bad, not bad at all. We’re some way into the game by now, and she’s narrowed down the weapon (dagger) and murderer (Miss White). All that’s left is to eliminate a couple more locations – the billiard room, conservatory, and library are still in the running – then she’s won. No wonder she can hardly contain herself. It’s a great effort for a lass of her age. She’s not as young as you think, mind, this girl who will grow up to give birth to Mummy. Gloria is what we might term a micro mite, titchy in stature, which makes her look more like seven or eight, rather than ten. And there’s something about the way she’s dressed – that ruched sky-blue silk dress with its broad sash round the waist, its scalloped arm holes, the matching bow tied at the back of her head. She’s playing games at home with her parents yet looks like she’s fit to visit the Queen. A doll. That’s what she makes you think of – you who lives in jeans and Fat Face hoodies and sweaters from Jack Wills. She looks like a living doll.

  What’s that? Ooh, the meanie! Gloria’s character is Miss White (she’s secretly thrilled to think she’s the murderer) and she’s been patiently advancing her counter towards the unexamined rooms. If luck is with her she’ll have solved the mystery within a few more goes. But now her father’s only gone and used his turn to whisk Miss White to the kitchen. Right over the other side of the board. Has he no heart? It’ll take Gloria ages to regain the ground, to get back to where she needs to be in order to win. Someone is bound to steal her victory in the meanwhile.

  Her jiggling abruptly stops. Her jaw muscles clench. Her mother glances at her sharply.

  ‘Archie!’

  The father, reaching for the lead pipe, freezes. He looks up at his wife. Angie and Archie. Angie inclines her head pointedly in their daughter’s direction.

  You can’t tell because you’re behind her, but Gloria’s face is rapidly reddening. Her eyes begin to brim.

  Archie looks from daughter to wife. His expression is impeaching. Were we to get inside his head we might find some sort of half-formed argument: This is only a game; surely you can’t —

  Angie’s eyes narrow. She’s a wee one, too, five foot nothing in
her stockinged feet. Fair of face, mind; what they call bonny hereabouts. Archie thinks about the consequences that will flow – the days of stony silence; the withdrawal of conjugal rights.

  ‘Actually.’ He lets go of the lead pipe, picks Miss White up and returns her to her former location. ‘I think I’ll accuse Colonel Mustard instead.’

  One more moment to soak up the heat, then we must return to the cold. Before we do, though, notice the little girl, Gloria. Even though the setback’s been reversed and she’s on her way to victory once more, she’s perfectly still – her excited jigging is done. She raises a hand, uses the heel of it to brush a tear from under her eye. Angie, from whom she evidently gets her blonde curls, reaches across and repeatedly strokes her thigh. Comforting her. Soothing her. Angie’s treacle smile slides off her face when she looks back at her husband. Her eyes have a hardness to them, now, as though they are reconstituted stone.

  Archie knows it’s too late, that what he did cannot now be undone. Gloria will be allowed to win; Gloria is always allowed to win. But it will no longer feel like a triumph. It’s been ruined. He’s ruined it. He feels like folding his cards and leaving the pair of them to it. If he did that, though. He moves the yellow counter and his chosen weapon over to the corner of the board.

  ‘Colonel Mustard, with the lead pipe, in the kitchen,’ he says. He sits back in his chair and sighs, then summons for his wife a thin smile. ‘Can you help with my enquiries, dear?’

  That’s it. We’re off. Straight up the chimney, hot and choking and sparky. Out through the pots like shots from a gun. Blam. Blam. Soaring near vertically. Within seconds, they’re far beneath us, Angie and Archie and Gloria, their home shrinking till it’s no bigger than a house for dolls.