‘As a coot,’ Betty says faintly, gazing from one to the other.
‘And you’ve got no neck,’ Emma adds for good measure. She thinks she is beginning to get the hang of Tamas.
His laughter rings out, and he slaps his ample belly. ‘This is also true.’
Then Emma catches the look on Betty’s face: startled, blinking. She has gone too far– she has got it wrong. Again. She doesn’t want Betty to think badly of her, but she has no idea what to say next.
She is saved by Tamas, who starts telling Betty what flowers he wasn’t able to get at the market that morning and which varieties he has put in their stead.
With a feeling of relief and slightly trembling hands, Emma returns to adding cherry tomatoes to her funeral wreath.
When Tamas leaves, Emma busies herself unpacking the new delivery of flowers, keeping her head bent, trying not to catch Betty’s eye. She can feel her watching her.
What Betty says next surprises her.
‘Les and I were wondering if you would like to join us tonight, here in the café? Just a small group of people. It’s the local History Society that Les is treasurer of. He’s doing a short talk– between you and me, I think he’s a bit nervous, so he could do with the support. The theme for this evening’s meeting is “Secrets of theTitanic”. You never know, love– you might find it interesting.’
What surprises Emma more than this invitation is that she looks up at Betty and replies, ‘Yes, that would be lovely.’
She meant to say, ‘Sorry, Betty, I’m busy.’
Chapter 2
Violet
Wildflowers
If she were to tell the story of her life, she would start among the flowers. That is where her memory began– picking wildflowers as she walked through the pale grasslands of the Argentine Pampas.
She suspects this is not the tale most people want to hear. Most would clamour to know about that one night, as they strain to imagine the low, grinding sound of ice against metal. She has come to realise that people want to sail close to the horror, skim the surface, feel the splash of icy water on their faces and then race on, unharmed.
Those who were there understand it cannot be like this. They know that the horror will reach up and pull you under. Her mother would tell those trying to sail closer and closer, to stay well away from the deep water.
She learnt early on in her life to heed her mother’s advice, and so she does not look into the cold, black depths if she can help it. She prefers to remember lives lived and oceans sailed.
The story she would wish to tell is about the small thread that was her life, and though her thread may have been thin– hold it to the light and you can barely make out its colour– when it was woven with other threads it made a cloth that stretched through time.
Somewhere within the weave would be her story of theTitanic, but she likes to think the cloth she was part of could be flung out full over a table or laid wide and taught across a room. It would not be a piece of fabric snagged on one single night.
She knows the pattern would be intricate, woven with flowers. Honeysuckle would be there– her mother would insist on that– and roses, lily of the valley and, of course, violets. She would like to stand back and admire how the sun catches the colours and textures within the cloth and say:
‘I was part of that.’
Chapter 3
Emma
Foxgloves
Why did she say, ‘Yes’?
Emma has never taken much interest in theTitanic. She did a school project on it when she was about eight or nine, and of course she saw the film. But the story of theTitanicwas much more Will’s kind of thing: documentaries, history, National Geographic. She recalls him once showing her some 3D imagery of the wreck of theTitanic– which, looking back,hadbeen fascinating.
Was that it? Had she thought for a split second that Will would be keen to go, that in another world, another life, this was something they might do together?
Whatever the reason, here she is, make-up on, smartish navy jacket over her jeans (what do you wear to a History Society talk?), making her way from the car park to the garden centre. From where she is standing by the entrance, she can see the broad window of the café facing her. She instinctively steps toher left, keeping a pillar hung with hanging baskets between her and the people gathering inside.
Les is there, wearing a smarter than normal fleece (it’s a cool evening for July) and Betty has on a denim shirt that appears to be embroidered with some kind of flying thing. Emma squints. Is that a flying fish? Surely not. Maybe an exotic bird?
