Behind the Scenes at the Museum by Kate Atkinson

Author:Kate Atkinson [Atkinson, Kate]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Women - England, Families, Family, Yorkshire (England), General, Sagas, Historical Fiction, Fiction, Domestic Fiction, Women
ISBN: 0552996181
Google: xVncfH11mvkC
Amazon: B001OBO6A4
Publisher: Picador
Published: 1850-01-02T08:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SEVEN

1960

Fire! Fire!

W E HAVE VISITED GILLIAN. SHE IS TUCKED UP, NICE AS ninepence, under a neat blanket of green turf that’s like a card table. We do not play cards on it, not even a simple game of Snap. Bunty stuffs a bunch of jewel-bright anemones into a stone that has holes in it. It reminds me of the stone on Burton Stone Lane – a big, black boulder at what was once the city boundary where country folk left their wares when York was in the throes of the plague. Now our Gillian is as untouchable as a plague victim. We couldn’t touch her even if we wanted to, unless we clawed away the turf and dug deep down into the cold, sour soil of the cemetery. Which we’re not about to do, especially as we’re both dressed in our favourite outfits for the visit, me in my tartan taffeta and Patricia in a plaid woollen skirt that’s stretched over a stiff tulle-net petticoat in all the pastel shades that flying saucer sweets come in. Her flying saucer skirt creaks and rasps around her thin legs which are strapped into stockings and suspenders and a pantie girdle while her ‘Junior Miss’ bra, and the junior breasts lurking inside it, make wrinkled patterns under her pink Courtelle sweater. Her mousy hair is scraped back into a pony-tail that is tied with a pink satin ribbon. Sometimes it’s hard to be a woman.

It would be pointless to dig anyway, for Gillian is not really here at all, but ‘Safe in the Arms of Jesus’. That’s what it says on her headstone –

Gillian Berenice Lennox

14th January 1948–24th December 1959

Beloved Daughter of George and Bunty

Safe in the Arms of Jesus

‘It doesn’t say anything about us,’ I whisper to Patricia as Bunty produces a duster from her handbag and starts rubbing the gravestone. More housework.

‘Us?’

‘Beloved Sister.’

‘Well, she wasn’t, was she?’ Patricia says reasonably and we are both immediately consumed by guilt for having thought such a thing. Come back, Gillian, all is forgiven. Come back and we’ll make you our Beloved Sister. Bunty takes out the kitchen scissors and starts snipping away at the turf. What will she do next, hoover? Gillian’s headstone is very plain and rather unexciting. I have been here before with my friend Kathleen and her mother to visit Kathleen’s grandfather’s grave and Kathleen and I played hide-and-seek amongst the gravestones. We particularly liked the ones with angels carved on them, either solitary and rather wan, or in pairs – one on either side, their wings hoisted protectively over the invisible inhabitant beneath. Kathleen and I spent some time pretending to be grave-guardian angels, using our blazers for wings.

Do you have to be dead to be safe in Jesus’ arms? Apparently not. Kathleen, who has already introduced me to the exotic, blood-soaked interior decoration of St Wilfred’s Catholic church, explains that we are all safe in His arms, especially the little children. Especially suffering ones, she adds. I think Patricia and I are suffering a good deal so this is good news.

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