Grief

Inside, the whitewashed church of St James was cold, and the glare of the sun against the walls was excruciating for Jasper, who had forgotten to bring dark glasses.  As funerals go, it was going well enough. Jasper slumped in the family pew of the village church, breathing slowly and trying to keep nausea at bay.  He spent most of the service with his eyes closed until his mother elbowed him in the ribs to tell him that it was his turn to do the reading. 

Jasper stood up and sightly staggering because the sun shining through the stained glass window hit right in his eye, or so he told himself. He walked towards the ancient and straightforward pulpit. He was so tired his eyes were half-closed, which is why he half tripped up the steps to the pulpit. The silence was broken by coughs which spread across the church and muffled giggles at the back of the church. 

In the pulpit, Jasper's eyes narrowed sharply, and he glared towards the sound of the giggles. He rested his hands on the front of the pulpit, more to keep himself standing than anything else. Jasper looked directly at his mother, and in a soft and gentle voice said directly to her;

                                     "Let your heart not be troubled."

He knew that she was quietly distraught over the death of his father. He had always been amazed that she had loved him through all his infidelities. Most of the women he knew would have walked out years ago. He knew it wasn't just her position and title of duchess, that kept her at the manor, she had genuinely loved his father.

Of course, he hadn't helped. God knows how she had put up with him when he was younger. He had been a bit wild at Cambridge but still managed to get a first and then he did his stint in the Army which included two tours in Helmand. The only thing his father had been pleased with, not that he had bothered to say so to him. He'd got that little nugget from Henry Conway, the family lawyer. 

Jasper glanced at the coffin, supported by trestles and covered with white roses and lilies. Just looking at it made him angry. Angry for the way his mother had been treated. He was angry. His father had been such a bastard to her.  He was mad because his father had never got on with him. Always criticising everything he had done, not even a handshake when he was Mentioned in Despatches, not that he expected one from anyone else he was just doing his job, but couldn't his dad have even said well done? 

His mother had protected him from lots of arguments with his father, and she had stood up for him many times.  He was sorry for being late this morning, the last thing he wanted was to upset her even more. Last night he'd cried, not for the father who died, but for the father he could have been.  

There were a few more coughs across the church.

                                     "You believe in God; believe also in me."

Jasper's voice rang out over the bowed heads and solemn faces. There was a 'Humph' from the middle of the congregation, and the coughing ceased immediately. Everyone's head slowly bowed. Jasper looked around, the chief constable glared back at him, his face pale with anger. He'd made an enemy there, but Samuel Chichester's cohort Gerry Mortimer the Lord Lieutenant of the county would soothe the way, especially if he wanted to continue doing business with his mother's stud.

Marcia Reed, the chairwoman of the parish council, had bagged the seat in between them, her large black sinamay hat, more suitable for a wedding, kept bashing each of the men on the head as she kept looking around. A lace-edged, snow-white handkerchief clutched in her hand as she wiped imaginary tears from her face. A forty-something widow of several years, Marcia was a committee junkie. She knew everyone in the village and most of their business too, whether they wanted her to or not. 

He had attended the last parish council meeting on behalf of his father, and Marcia Reed had done an excellent imitation of an octopus, her hands had been everywhere, touching his knee, his arm, his thigh. He'd moved seats away from her, sighting a riding injury.    All that was missing had been the black ink when the ravishing Lucy Calverley, who ran the coffee shop, had expressed her sympathy over his father. He might have to visit the coffee shop more often.

His mother cleared her throat, urging him to carry on with the reading. 

              "In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so,

             Would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?"

Standing at the back of the church were members of the village, including that long streak of crap, Roper Allbright, the chair of the county council. Rumour had it that he wanted to put a bypass on his land. He'd be kicked up the bypass if he tried anything like that. 

He was just about to carry on with the reading when the main door opened and someone edged through the crowd at the back. 

Jasper watched him as he pushed his way through. He had no idea who the man was, even though he looked familiar. He leaned against the wall, or rather, against the tombstone of Sir Henry Applewick, who if he had still been alive would have probably spit the shaven-headed thug on his trusty sword. 

Jasper finished his reading and slumped comfortably back into the pew he closed his eyes not wanting to look at the coffin. Still breathing slowly to assuage nausea, which was barely helped by the scent of the lilies, he was soothed by The Reverend Quentin Peabody who had a voice that would lull a complete insomniac into a comforting doze. 

Miss Pinkerton played them out on the organ and missed a note when she had to wipe the tears from her eyes. Ten years older than his father, she always had an eye for him.

The frosty February air bit into his cheeks and nose as he guided his softly weeping mother to the Neyve mausoleum where his father would spend the rest of eternity as his final resting place.   Someone had painted the railings around the stone building since the last time he'd been here, and the ancient yew trees stood guard over the grave.  

The churchyard looked precisely as it always had done certainly for as long as he'd been alive and probably for the last seven hundred years.  No one was buried here anymore except the family and a few village residents who had family plots. Most of the newcomers were up at the council cemetery on the other side of the village. 

He would hate for that to be the final resting place he had always found the idea of the family mausoleum very comforting. 

Thankfully most of the congregation had gone back to the house this simple ceremony was just for family, which included long time employees. People who might as well have been family. Francis Braxton, the butler, who at twenty years older than Jasper, and had come to Shettleham when was a baby Francis had become not just an employee, but almost a father figure and far more amiable than his father.

There was Mary and Betty Blakeney, sisters who ran the household, Mary the cook and Betty the housekeeper. Their role was much more than that to Jasper they might both as well have been grandmothers to him.  He knew that they would never let him retire them, and they would more than likely die on the job.

George Walker, the estate manager, put Mary's arm through his, and Eric Shipley, the head gardener, did the same with Betty. Major Baverstock, who ran the stables, walked with them. 

Jasper watched Henry Conway, his father's solicitor having a word with Chichester, patting his back in a placatory manner as the chief constable made his feelings known left them on the path to the house and came to join them at the mausoleum. 

These seven people were more of a family than the man in the ornate lead-lined coffin in front of him. His father kept him at arm's length, a case of do what I say, and not what I do.  

He was no father, didn't even know the meaning of the word, or husband either. Perhaps now his mother would find some happiness at last, but please not with that obsequious man Chichester.

At last, the door to the mausoleum was finally closed, and Jasper put his mother's arm through his and together they walked back up the lane to the manor. 

They were silent for a while,  both of them watching a couple of horses in the paddock. 

"Scooby looks fit," Jasper said of the chestnut who was shaking his mane knowing that his mistress was near.

"Yes, he's going to Cheltenham next month. Your father loved going there. It was the one thing we shared." 

"I could go with you if you'd like me to?" 

"Well, maybe," Rosslyn shrugged "If you can remember."

Jasper let out a sigh, his breath forming a little cloud. "I'm sorry, about earlier, it was a complete accident. I…"

     "No, Jasper, that's just the point," she said as she watched her horse. "It wasn't an accident at all it was a total lack of consideration on your part. You went back to London to see a client, which I understand. I know you needed to see him after you had waited so long to paint his portrait, but honestly, Jasper would it have been so hard just to come home and rally the troops? You have a responsibility here now, and drinking with your friends will have to wait." She stopped walking and glanced at her son, "I don't know what's in your father's will, I'm hoping everything is just left to you as it always was, but be warned, your father spent lots of time with Henry before he was bedridden. They had some big arguments about the things your father wanted in his will. I know you don't want to hear this, darling, but your father might still be running your life from his grave.