Lionel appeared at the church doors, dressed formally for the ceremony in cassock, surplice and stole. He invited everyone inside where Lilian’s coffin had lain overnight, as she’d wanted. The church was filled with flowers of all colours. Stargazer lilies scented the whole building. They’d all been cut from her garden, Marnie knew. Herv had done this for her.
Titus Sutton had bagged himself the best seat in the house, obviously. His tall, thin, dour wife Hilary sat rigidly beside him. A heavy-set man in a business-like pinstripe suit with large facial features, whom Marnie didn’t recognise, sat at the front on the right-hand side. Herv, Marnie thought, might have sat with Cilla, Johnny and Zoe had Ruby not curled her arm around his like a hungry boa constrictor and pressured him to sit beside her and her mother. Griff was playing the organ and beautifully so. She saw Lionel beckon her to the front but she waved that she was fine a few rows back, behind the villagers. Emelie moved seats to join her.
They sang before any words were spoken – Lilian’s favourite hymn: ‘Praise to the Lord, the Almighty’. Lionel’s voice rang out as clear and pure a sound as one of his church bells, his faith affirmed in the lyrics. There was a silence after the song had ended, one soaked in drama and emotion. Then Lionel began to speak.
‘We are gathered here to celebrate the life of our dear, dear Lilian,’ and his voice crumbled like an Oreo base with too little butter in it. There was an uncomfortable lapse whilst he struggled to regain his composure and when he did, he apologised, but throughout the whole sermon it became evident his strength was a big dog on a weak leash. It was clear his affection for Lilian ran deeper even than Marnie had thought.
Marnie’s tissue was in shreds now. Emelie handed her another and when Marnie turned to her to mouth thank you, she found the old lady’s bright blue eyes cloudy with tears ready to fall down her powdered cheeks.
‘When Lilian asked me to sit down and discuss what should happen when this day came, I really didn’t really want to,’ said Lionel, after a fortifying breath. ‘The thought of saying goodbye to her wasn’t something I wanted even to contemplate, but she was most adamant that it would be played out to her script. She even ordered the sunshine.’ A slight ripple of laughter from the assembled mourners. ‘Lilian Dearman was the last of a noble line. And she was the greatest of that line. I think you all know the word she reserved for her antecedents.’
‘Bastards,’ mumbled someone and a flurry of loud shhhs ensued.
‘Lilian only gave of herself what she wanted others to have. Those who have known her longest, have not necessarily known her the best.’ Whether intentional or not, the vicar’s eyes drifted to Titus on the front row. ‘Lilian Dearman entered this world on January the first 1950, by caesarean section. She was a Dearman and as such was not destined to arrive without drama and ceremony.’ A trickle of affectionate laughter at that. ‘She was born into a life of privilege and yet it was the simple things that made Lilian tick, those that money cannot buy, which marked her as very different from the rest of her family. When she refused to take part in the Pickering Hunt because foxes deserved better, her father locked her in the tower of the manor for a week for that insubordination, but she never did go hunting.
‘Her father labelled her: imperfection personified. To that I say glorious imperfection –’ He shook his fist, his voice now strong as the gesture. ‘Lilian Dearman was the most perfectly imperfect woman I ever met. Generous, stupidly so, sweet, kind, principled . . . loving. Loving to the ex-racing greyhounds she adopted, loving to people, even loving to things: plants, her home, her books, her collection of mended treasures which she displayed so reverently and she was a faithful and loyal friend—’ he hiccupped, stalled, recalibrated, ‘and we shall all miss her in our different ways.
‘For instance, Cilla, her beloved housekeeper, will miss her insistence that on very hot days, she should abandon the cleaning and go and sit in the garden with Griff. I quote, “Life is too short to be changing beds when the sun makes a rare appearance in this bloody country”.’ In the front row, Cilla was nodding as if she was a toy full of fresh batteries. ‘Emelie will miss their deep and rewarding relationship, David will miss her over-zealous testing of his home-brewed beers, wines and spirits and I will miss the girl whom I’ve known all my life.’ Lionel’s voice cracked and he had to pull his handkerchief out of his pocket, taking a few moments both to blow his nose and to compose himself. Then he left the pulpit and approached the coffin, placing his hand gently on the top. ‘I invite you all, for a moment, to think of a precious memory of this . . . this lady who has been so wonderfully kind to all of us. Our lady of the manor. Lilian.’ He dropped his head, and everyone followed his lead and did the same.
Marnie thought of meeting Lilian for the first time in Skipperstone and how the old lady’s face had lit up on seeing her. She thought of Lilian flipping the bird out of the window of her Rolls Royce before she zoomed away. She thought of sitting in Lilian’s conservatory and hearing stories of her family and thinking – at the essence of it all – how similarly the track of their lives had run. And how it had taken hardly any time at all to fall in love with Lilian Dearman.
They sang the Lord’s Prayer, Derek, David and Lionel supplying a perfect bass descant they must have been used to. The echo from the last note hung like smoke in the air.
‘Please, friends, people of Wychwell and beyond. Would you follow Lilian into the churchyard where we will say our final goodbyes,’ said Lionel.
The pall-bearers appeared and lifted Lilian’s coffin onto their shoulders. Griff began to play the jaunty ‘Bring Me Sunshine’ and people started to sing along with it as they stood up. Lionel followed the coffin out of his church, Titus making sure he was immediately behind him, heading up the temporal procession.
‘Lilian’s favourite song. She loved Morecambe and Wise,’ said Emelie with a smiling sigh and Marnie thought that it was fitting. Lilian Dearman was the sort of person who would bring the sunshine along with her if it wasn’t there.
Herv smiled and nodded at her as he passed; Ruby gave her the evil eye. Marnie didn’t care, she was looking at the coffin and thinking how surreal it was that her friend lay lifeless within it.
Emelie and Marnie were among the last out. ‘Can I hold onto you, dear?’ the old lady asked.
‘Of course,’ said Marnie, crooking her arm and walking slowly in tune with Emelie’s pace.
‘She didn’t want to go in the family crypt underneath the church,’ said Emelie. ‘She wanted to be outside with the flowers.’
‘I can’t say I blame her,’ said Marnie. ‘From what she’s told me about them.’
‘Dear Lilian,’ said Emelie, dabbing at her eyes with her handkerchief. ‘I shall miss her so much. She was the best of people. The very very best.’
The sky was blue and cloudless today: the sun had returned after a week of cloud and drizzle as if it had honoured a diary date to shine down on them all as Lilian’s body was lowered into the ground in a large plot near an ancient cherry tree. It had flowered late and when the breeze stirred, the blossom billowed in the air and fell upon the mourners like confetti.
‘Look, it’s like the wedding she never had,’ said Titus too loudly. Marnie noticed Lionel casting him a very unchristian look.