Draca. Geoffrey Gudgion
the door was putting a cup of tea beside a chair, her smile as shiny as the institutional china in her hand. Resilient. Caring but functional.
Jack caught her eye. ‘ Hi, Sandra. ’
Sandra looked up and her smile broadened, probably because she ’ d recognised someone she didn ’ t have to watch die. Jack wondered how anyone had the emotional strength to do Sandra ’ s job : palliative care, with success measured by the gentleness of inevitable death.
‘ Hey, Jack. ’ She frowned past Jack at Harry, clearly wondering who he was.
‘ This is my father. How ’ s Grandpa? ’
Sandra winced, and spoke softly. ‘ Soon, now. Today ’ s a good day, so far. We wheeled him into the garden. ’ She lifted her chin towards the French windows. ‘ He ’ s talking OK . ’
Jack nodded, relieved. In the early days, there had been regular spaces in between doses of medication when they could talk; the calm between stupor and agony. Now his grandfather was on ad- lib morphine, you had to be lucky. Even when he was lucid, he could be confused. Jack stepped out into the garden, leaving Harry to fire questions at Sandra in brisk, sergeant-major tones.
Grandpa Eddie sat in a wheelchair on the lawn, face lifted to the sun, eyes shut, with an oxygen bottle for company. Lines trailed from his arm to a drip on a stand beside him. He ’ d lost so much weight that he ’ d shrunk within his clothes, and his neck stretched like a tortoise ’ s through the gaping collar of his shirt. He had almost no hair left, just a few thin wisps of silver fluff, and no eyebrows either. Once he ’ d had great bushy things, thicker even than Harry ’ s, as if a pair of rodents had crawled onto his face and nested. Like the hair, they hadn ’ t come back after the chemo. Jack pulled a chair over to sit beside him, on the side away from the sun, and squeezed his arm.
‘ Jack, my boy! ’ Eddie ’ s voice was surprisingly strong. Not quite at the level at which he used to bellow into a storm at sea, but still robust enough to belie the yellow skin. His eyes seemed to sparkle from deeper within their sockets, as if the man was shrinking inside himself. Broken veins on his face gave a bizarre parody of health, like an apple-cheeked skull.
‘ How are you, Grandpa? ’ Stupid bloody question. He was dying.
‘ There are good days, and there are bad days. The good days are when you come. ’
Great. He was making sense. Sometimes he and Jack could have a decent chat; sometimes Eddie would rave as if another person was locked in the same body, someone altogether nastier.
‘ Are you comfortable? ’ How the hell do you ask an old man if he can handle the pain? That ’ s what the doctors had promised : ‘ We ’ ll keep him comfortable for as long as we can. ’
Eddie didn ’ t answer. For the first time Jack saw fear in his eyes.
‘ He ’ s in the garden, now. He ’ s coming for me, Jack. ’
‘ Who ’ s in the garden, Grandpa? ’ Sometimes Jack had to humour him. The hospice lawn held nothing more threatening than figures slumped on benches.
‘ No. My garden. ’ Eddie shook his head hard enough to shake the dangling tubes. ‘ Harald ’ s waiting at the cottage. ’ Eddie pronounced the name in two, equally emphasised syllables in the Nordic way. Har- Rald . He groped at Jack ’ s arm, staring at him again as if willing him to believe. Jack smiled in a way that he hoped was reassuring, and nodded past Eddie ’ s shoulder to where his father was crossing the lawn. Sandra watched from the doorway.
‘ No, Grandpa, Harry ’ s here. ’ Eddie had always referred to his son as ‘ Harry ’ rather than ‘ your father ’ , so Jack used the old man ’ s language. ‘ He ’ s come to see you. ’
Disbelief, then horror, tightened his grandfather ’ s face into a rictus of fear as Harry ’ s shadow fell across them.
‘ How did he find me? ’ Eddie kept his eyes locked on Jack, but shook his head from side to side, denying Jack ’ s words. ‘ He ’ s dead. ’ The grip on Jack ’ s arm tightened as if Jack was a fixed point of safety in the middle of a nightmare. ‘ Harald ’ s dead. ’ Beside them, Harry Ahlquist flinched as if he ’ d been struck on the face. Jack lifted Grandpa Eddie ’ s hand and nodded towards his father.
‘ No, Grandpa. Look. ’
Eddie turned, lifting one hand to shield his eyes as he squinted into the sun. Tubes snagged against the oxygen bottle.
‘ Not here. ’ Louder now, almost shouting. ‘ He ’ s following me. ’ Eddie tried to get up, lurching away from Harry so that the drip almost fell and Jack had to catch him. Sandra began to walk towards them, frowning.
‘ Harald died on the beach. He ’ s DEAD. ’
The shout turned heads all around the garden, and Sandra started to run. Harry squatted, dropping out of the sun ’ s glare, and reached out a hand to touch the old man on the arm. ‘ Pa, please. ’ Eddie squirmed into Jack, whimpering, as Harry tried to turn him, and in a moment of sick pity Jack saw liquid dripping from his grandfather ’ s seat. The tang of fresh urine cut the scent of flowers.
‘ Pa, it ’ s your son, Harry. ’
‘ Shot down like a dog. ’ The shout became a scream. By the time Sandra eased Harry away, Eddie was gripping Jack ’ s shoulder hard enough to hurt. It was incredible that someone so sick could have such strength.
‘ Don ’ t let him take me, Jack. ’ The scream disintegrated into a sob.
Sandra jerked her head towards the building. Time to go. Jack rose and slid his hand along his father ’ s shoulders to turn him away. It was the nearest he ’ d ever come to giving him a hug.
‘ We ’ ll try again tomorrow, Dad. ’
Harry shrugged the arm away, his face working.
*
Jack rang Charlotte afterwards to say he ’ d stay in Grandpa Eddie ’ s cottage for the night. It was two and a half hours ’ drive home, and the end was close. His wife didn ’ t sound too fussed. She might even have been relieved. She had a girlie night out planned, it seemed. Pals from the gym. Harry didn ’ t offer a bed, and it didn ’ t occur to Jack to ask, so he bought a takeaway and a bottle of cheap wine and wandered through Eddie ’ s cottage, wishing that his grandfather could drift away peacefully on a cloud of morphine. There was such fear in the old man ’ s eyes these days. It didn ’ t seem to be fear of death itself, but as the cancer ate into his brain he ’ d started raving as if the Grim Reaper lurked in the shadows. Today, it had been Harry, his own son. Two days earlier, it had been ‘ a Viking warrior in the trees ’ .
But then, Grandpa had always been obsessed with his Viking heritage. He was the kind of guy who taught himself Old Norse so that he could read the old sagas in their original form. The bookshelves in the cottage ’ s front room were packed with volumes of Viking history. Some of them were antiques, printed in Old Norse with Danish translations. Some had paper bookmarks sticking upwards, each with some cryptic reference written in Grandpa ’ s arthritic script.
Jack ran his finger along the books ’ spines, reading his grandfather ’ s life in the shelves above the desk. A small photograph of his parents was wedged on a high shelf between almanacs and magazines, pushed almost end-on so the picture was partly obscured. A middle shelf held framed happy snaps of Jack ’ s sister Tilly and her children. There was a larger one of Jack at his passing-out parade, his face tight with pride beneath the coveted Commando green beret with the globe-and-laurel badge of the Royal Marines. Dominating the bottom shelf, in between Sagas of the Norse Kings and the mighty Old Norse Dictionary and Grammar , was a big, framed photograph of Eddie ’ s beloved sailing boat heeling under a press of sail, with a younger Grandpa at the tiller. The sails were traditional, red- ochre canvas; Grandpa refused to ‘ sully ’ a hundred-year-old