Blame

A woman is writing a letter. Let’s watch her. She is an old woman, white-haired, strict as a stick in her sitting, her spine in exact parallel to the untouched back of her chair, but don’t be fooled. This is a stance of schooling, of breeding, of character, not of arthritic age. She is not arthritic, and even if she was. She sits, as it seems, without weariness, without weight. And if her hair is admirable, now, for its purity, only a certain sort of woman, she would have told you, suffering its stages and changes, sunshine to honey to silvered auburn to salt and pepper to soiled then ultimate snow, colours her hair. Or would she have seen it as suffering? Or even discussed the matter? If only to make the point? She touches herself, each morning, after her brisk shower, with scent in four places, always has, to her dying day, always will. She is that sort of woman.

A single notepaper page lies on the table, an envelope of matching make precisely placed alongside.

She writes with a fountain pen.

She will make no mistakes.

Her notepaper is, of course, as is proper, printed with her house address, the envelope, in that regard, discreet, anonymous, unclamorous, properly plain.

She begins, without doubt or hesitation, with the day’s date, at the top, to the right, the month in roman, as taught, as trained, never inscribed otherwise, the other numbers not.

The sound of her pen is the only audible intrusion on the silence around.

Now the letter.

If she thinks, to compose, to consider, if she has to think, there is no sign of it, neither on her face nor in the manner of her hand, no outward show.

She is brisk.

You could almost say businesslike.

The pen flows uninterrupted.

There.

Finished.

Done.

She has no need to reread, and doesn’t.

She is not, as we’ve noted, a woman to make mistakes.

She signs underneath her name.

Now the envelope.

She consults, here, an address book, a black volume of much visible use, glances at it, really, the appropriate entry, little more than that, and when her envelope is addressed, scores it out, in strong black lines of inked oblivion, from her book.

Her coat is ready.

Her purse.

She never wears a hat.

She leaves her house through the kitchen, crosses quickly the bricked yard, enters the orchard, her beloved apple trees, the netted closure of soft fruit. Someone has left the gate open, here, onto the field, which she will have to talk to her man about, a frown disturbing for an instant the set of her face. Then she forgets it, or places it rather, on that further shelf of duties to be attended, following, now, the path of foot-made long establishment to the field’s further edge. Then over the stile with no break in pace—remarkable at her age, at any age—to enter the little woods, as they’re locally called, all dark and dense for the merest minute, and here she is at the village, crossing the street, the general shop.

A stamp, she says.

Mrs Hoskins knows better than to tell her an airmail envelope would have been your better go.

Lovely morning, she says instead. Nice nip.

Her customer licks and affixes herself the stamp.

Now we may follow this letter to its addressed and intended destination, except let’s skip the journey, the details, the duration, place ourselves, privileged observers, at its reception, the man opening the door of his letterbox, the envelope angled inside. Which he lifts out. Which he holds. Which he looks at, front and back. Which he tears in half, unread, unopened, his bin for recycled paper handy alongside—although I like the idea, can also see it, propped for a time unopened on the man’s mantelpiece, the ink, the stamp, the envelope, and when looked at long enough, savoured or deliberated, neither word accurate, nor any other, no word will do, until flicked, flung, casually or finally dropped, as you will, as you require, into the fireplace, slowly or rapidly rendered to invisible ash.

Or we can walk with her home, now, the letter just posted, the other way, the front way, the way she’s now walking, down and along the village street. Past the butcher. Past the garage. Now there’s the row of cottages, the yew tree, the hedge. The bus shelter. The notice board nobody uses. And in a minute, around the corner, where the street or road makes its first turn, in hint through the trees and all at once visible, the church.

To which side she crosses.

Aloof of passing traffic, which fortunately that moment there isn’t.

She’s not going home.

Nor to the church, it seems, whose porch she denies even a glance, an acknowledgement, shunning its invitation of comfort and availability to continue uninterrupted to the small graveyard beyond.

She belongs to two graves here, or they belong to her.

The first she ignores.

At the second she stops.

She stands.

Well, I’ve done it, my dear, she says. I said I would and I did. It’s done,

You might imagine otherwise, but she speaks the words out loud.

It’s done, she says.

Her face shows no emotion, not her eyes, not her mouth.

She stands.

She simply stands.

Even when she bends, suddenly, when she stoops, when she picks something from the path, the ground.

As again to stand.

Simply to stand.

To be discovered by the vicar, who smiles, who approaches, who sees, who retreats, who leaves her where she stands, silent, by her daughter’s grave, her mad mouth stuffed with stones.