The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper(37)

He found a bench opposite a square where a couple and their English bull terrier were enjoying a picnic in the dark. They drank from the neck of a bottle of Prosecco.

The bench was well illuminated by a streetlamp, and when Arthur sat and opened the book, the pages glowed orange. Running his finger down the index he found the poem “Ma Chérie.”

Ma Chérie

Your laugh tinkles, your eyes twinkle.

How can I ever be alone without you?

You help me live, you hear me cry

Yet your lips do not spill, they do not lie.

A lithe body, chestnut hair

India, and to me.

Yet you say you do not see

And that matters greatly to me.

A brief romance but so vital.

Our fingers touch and you know

Your importance to me, your glow.

Togetherness.

Ma Chérie

Arthur shut the book. He felt sick. There was no doubt the poem was about his wife, even if De Chauffant preferred men. The references to her hair and where she had lived before were obvious.

It was evident to him that this had been a major love affair—one full of passion and which compelled De Chauffant to pen a poem. Arthur had never written letters to his wife, let alone a poem.

If you don’t want to find woodlice, don’t go looking under wood. His mother had said that to him once. The memory flooded back. He screwed his eyes shut and tried to remember when and where, but all other details evaded him. He wished that he could be with her now, a small boy again with no worries or responsibilities. But when he opened his eyes he saw his own wrinkled hands grasping the book.

So, now he knew about the book charm, and the elephant and the tiger. There was still the paint palette, ring, flower, the thimble and the heart.

He was an old man sitting on a bench in London. He had a sore ankle and an aching feeling of emptiness from leaving Sebastian behind in his book-lined prison, but he had to carry on his quest.

He closed the book of poetry and left it on the bench. As he walked away he couldn’t help but wonder which little charm he’d find out about next.





Lucy the Second


ARTHUR DIDN’T HAVE a plan. He hadn’t thought beyond finding De Chauffant. He had a few toiletries in his rucksack but hadn’t booked into a hotel for the night, half expecting to travel back home that evening. It was late now, gone ten. He had handwritten out the train times to return home to York, but he didn’t fancy getting on board a night bus to take him to King’s Cross station, or tackling the tube for the first time.

He walked the streets until he no longer had any inkling where he was, or even who he was. Images and snippets of conversations ran through his head. Sebastian’s eye peeping through the door was juxtaposed with watching Miriam in bed as she slept on their honeymoon. In his mind, he wiped away a tear as he dropped Dan off at school for the first time, but then he saw the man at the Pearly Queen café trying to decide which of his two lovers to marry.

He was once Arthur Pepper, beloved husband of Miriam and devoted dad to Dan and Lucy. It was so simple. But now he said that to himself, it sounded like a bog-standard obituary. What was he now? Miriam’s widower? No. There had to be more to him than that. He couldn’t be defined by his wife’s death. Where would he go to next? What would his next clue be?

He was too tired to think, annoyed at the things whirring around in his mind. Please stop, he thought as he trudged around yet another corner. He found himself on a lively street. A group of kids were hanging around outside a fast-food place, eating stringy pizza from a cardboard box and pushing one another into the road. A black cab slammed on its brakes and honked its horn. The kids jeered. Tables of tourist merchandise still lined the streets. Pashminas two for ￡10, phone chargers, T-shirts, guidebooks.

The sounds and sights filled Arthur’s head even more. He wanted to lie down somewhere quiet and let his brain process the events of the day, to think what to do next.

Along the street there was a small sign on a door. Hostel. Without thinking he walked inside.

A young Australian woman on reception wore a white vest, which showed off the blue tribal tattoo that covered her right shoulder. She informed him that it was thirty-five pounds for a room for the night and there was only one bed left. She gave Arthur a rolled-up gray blanket and floppy pillow and directed him down a corridor to the room at the end.

Arthur had expected that he might have to share a twin room, but he stepped inside the room to find three bunk beds and five German girls sitting on the floor. They all wore denim shorts and too-tight checked shirts over colored bras. They were sharing a crusty loaf, slab of Edam cheese and cans of cider.

Masking his surprise Arthur bid them a cheery hello, then located the bed in the room that wasn’t piled high with clothes and rucksacks. He didn’t want to make a fool of himself by climbing into his bunk and finding that his knees seized halfway up, so he excused himself to reception where he read a three-day-old newspaper until the girls filed out of the room. He watched as they gave one another donkey rides as they headed out for the night.

He thought about how exuberant he himself used to feel as he got ready to meet Miriam when they first started courting. Butterflies flew in his stomach as he washed, shaved, slicked back his hair with a comb and smear of Brylcreem. He made sure that his suit and shirt were pressed, his shoes were buffed. He would put his comb in his pocket and whistle as he walked to meet her. There was an ice cream parlor where they would sit in the window and drink lemonade with a blob of vanilla floating on top, or they sometimes went to the cinema. At that time a trainee, he didn’t have much money so he would save up all week just in case Miriam wanted to go for a nice meal, but she was happy to go for a walk with him and with their simple dates. He didn’t know at that time that she’d lived with tigers, and had a poem written about her by a famous French writer.