The Last of the Bowmans Read online

  THE LAST OF THE BOWMANS

  After an absence of some seven years, Greg Bowman returns from America to find his father lying in a bamboo coffin, his estranged brother Billy stalking a woman with no feet, and his seventy-nine-year-old Uncle Frank planning to rob a bank. While renovating the family house, he is unexpectedly visited by the presence of his father and charged with the task of ‘fixing’ the family. In the course of his reluctant investigations, Greg discovers not only the secrets behind his brother’s and uncle’s strange behaviours, but also an unsettling secret of his father’s, and one that brings him face to face with the unintended consequences of his own past. The Last of the Bowmans is about a family on the run from itself in a city with no place to go.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  J. Paul Henderson studied American History and worked in publishing. He now lives in a house in England, drives a car and owns a television set. And that’s about it.

  Praise for Last Bus to Coffeeville

  ‘exceptionally good… the characters and plot are fantastic and I really couldn’t praise it enough’ – Bookseller

  ‘I found myself laughing out loud with the characters. I really enjoyed this story’– Jane Brown, Book Depository

  ‘A wonderful cast of eccentric people in the best tradition of old-time American writers like Capote and Keillor. I was enthralled throughout and recommend it to anyone who wants a feel-good read’– New Books Magazine

  ‘There is heartbreak… black humour… and the charm of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry’ – Daily Mail

  ‘A fascinating and poignant novel’ – Woman’s World

  ‘… the shimmering humour and life values Henderson explores are certainly something you wouldn’t want to miss’ – The Star Online

  ‘A funny road trip story… but this brave debut novel also tackles sensitive issues and does so in a confident manner’ – We Love This Book

  ‘Deftly handled with an offbeat humour and a deal of worldly compassion’– Sunday Sport

  ‘J. Paul Henderson is someone to watch out for’– The Bookbag

  ‘One of the best feel-good books I have ever read!’– culturefly.co.uk

  ‘An interesting delight… a brilliant debut’– Our Book Reviews Online

  ‘It’s rare to find a first novel that has as sure a touch as this one, with the writing being a combination of Bill Bryson travelogue with humour from James Thurber and Garrison Keillor * * * * *’– Goodreads

  ‘If The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared was a book you enjoyed then I’m sure this book will delight and entertain you just as much’– Library Thing

  ‘This is a book well worth reading * * * * *’ – Shelfari

  ‘Overall I thought the book flowed beautifully and I thoroughly enjoyed it. There will inevitably be comparisons with The Hundred-Year-Old Man – and I’m certain that if you enjoyed that book you will love this one too * * * * *’– Goodreads

  For the Uncle Franks of this world

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Opening credits: Jimmy Two-Crowns, John, Keshini, Mike, Poh Eng, Rich (literally), Sheila, Steve, Steven, Trevor and Val.

  Exiting credits: Claire, Clare and Ion.

  16 JUNE 2012

  Lyle Bowman was an old man with a sweet tooth, though which of his twelve remaining teeth the adage referred to is unknown.

  He was in the downstairs hallway, painting an area of scuffed skirting board, when the day’s sugar craving hit. Immediately he walked to the kitchen and placed his paintbrush in a jar of white spirit, wiped his hands on a damp cloth and pulled on his jacket. What he needed, he decided, was a Cadbury’s Double Decker.

  He was about to leave the house when he remembered the sachet of antibiotics he’d dissolved in water that morning and forgotten to drink. (His dentist, Mr Blum, had insisted on him completing a three-day course of the drug before extracting yet another of his teeth that had loosened in the gum.)

  ‘Teeth!’ Lyle sighed, and downed the liquid in one.

  He was prepared for the unpleasantness of the taste, but was surprised by the heat of the liquid as it passed down his throat. He grimaced, the same way he did after swallowing a tablespoonful of cod liver oil, and reached in his pocket for a peppermint.

  ‘Blooming dentists!’ Lyle sighed.

  Lyle locked the front door behind him and walked up the garden path. He saw Mrs Turton standing at the next-door window and waved to her. She waved back and smiled. He fumbled with the catch on the wrought-iron gate and set off for the local shops.

  Lyle Bowman had never once in his life been drunk and was therefore incapable of recognising the tell-tale signs of inebriation. A glass of sherry on Christmas Day, and the occasional half pint of beer during the year, had made for a lifetime consumption of probably no more than 250 units. Consequently, he placed the feeling of light-headedness – and his increasingly unsteady gait – at the feet of the magnolia paint fumes he’d been breathing, and reminded himself to open the window when he returned home.

  He entered the shop and made his way uncertainly to the shelves where the confectionery was displayed. Eventually, he found the Double Decker he was looking for and took it to the check-out. There, he faffed in his trouser pocket for a pound coin and, at last, placed it on the counter.

  ‘That’s 72p,’ the assistant said.

  ‘72p?’ Lyle slurred. ‘They’re only 57p across the road. That makes your price…’ He struggled to calculate the exact price difference, and was reduced to ending his sentence on a less emphatic note – ‘a lot more expensive.’

  ‘I just work here, mate, I don’t set the prices,’ the assistant shrugged. ‘Now do you want the Double Decker or don’t you?’

  ‘I don’t!’ Lyle said, a little more aggressively than he usually spoke to people. ‘I’m taking my business across the road.’

  It was a bad decision.

  Rather than walk to the zebra crossing, Lyle took the more direct route – or, at least, it would have been more direct if he hadn’t traversed it diagonally – and crossed the road at a bend where motorists and pedestrians were blind to each other.

  It was here that Lyle Bowman made his fateful acquaintance with a bus.

  A small crowd gathered and stood around his unmoving body, keeping him company while the ambulance arrived.

  ‘I think he’s trying to say something,’ one of the bystanders said.

  A man in his twenties knelt down by Lyle’s side.

  ‘Double Decker,’ Lyle sighed softly.

  ‘No, it was a single-decker,’ the young man replied helpfully. ‘One of those small buses.’

  Lyle Bowman died in the ambulance on his way to hospital. He was eighty-three years old.

  1

  Bamboo

  Three weeks later, Lyle Bowman was lying in a bamboo coffin at the front of a small crematory chapel. It was unusual for him to be the centre of such attention.

  Although the summer was at its height, a low pressure system had moved in from the west and the day of the funeral was one of grey skies and rain. Barometric gloom shook hands with atmospheric gloom and, to Mrs Turton’s way of thinking, made for the perfect funeral. She turned to her son Barry, who was sitting next to her.

  ‘I think God’s sad that Mr Bowman’s dead,’ she whispered. ‘The raindrops are His tears.’

  Barry, who was as credulous as his mother, nodded in agreement. He looked at his watch. ‘I’m supposed to pick Diane up from the hairdresser’s at twelve,’ he whispered back. ‘Shouldn’t the service have started by now?’

  T
he same thought was running through The Reverend Tinkler’s mind. Conscious that mourners for the next funeral would soon be arriving, and aware of the crematorium’s reputation for gridlock, he approached Lyle’s eldest son, who was sitting with his wife and young daughter.

  ‘I’m sorry, Billy, but I think we need to start.’

  Billy looked flustered and turned again to the rear door.

  ‘Face it, Billy, he’s not coming,’ his wife said sharply. ‘He never made an effort to see your father while he was alive, so why on earth do you think he’s going to make an effort now?’

  ‘But he promised, Jean,’ Billy replied. ‘He said he’d be here.’

  ‘Go ahead and start,’ Jean told The Reverend. ‘I don’t want the service to end before Katy’s had a chance to sing her song.’

  Billy reluctantly nodded his acquiescence and The Reverend Tinkler walked to the podium. He stood there silently for a moment and surveyed the congregation, wondered if so few people would gather for his own funeral when the time came. Even though a modest man by nature, he was still hoping for more than twelve.

  Unaware of The Reverend’s private reflections, the small congregation returned his gaze expectantly, no one more so than Lyle’s younger brother Frank, who was wrestling with the volume control of his hearing-aid.

  ‘Turn it down, Uncle Frank,’ Billy whispered. ‘It’s whistling.’

  ‘What’s he saying then?’ Uncle Frank replied. ‘I can’t hear a damn word!’

  ‘He’s not saying anything,’ Billy explained.

  ‘Why not? You paid the man, didn’t you?’

  ‘Of course I did – and keep your voice down: you’re shouting.’

  ‘Well, what’s he doing then? Holding out for more money?’

  ‘He’s just gathering his thoughts. Look – he’s about to start.’

  As if on cue, The Reverend Tinkler coughed gently and welcomed the gathered few. They were there, he said, not to mourn the passing of Lyle Bowman but to celebrate his life, and suggested they start by singing ‘O Happy Home’ – though just the first and last verses, as time was now short.

  On hearing the name Lyle Bowman, two of the congregation rose from their seats and headed for the exit, explaining to the persons nearest to them that they were at the wrong funeral. (It was fortunate for Lyle, The Reverend Tinkler reflected, that no quorum was required for such occasions.)

  Billy, who had presumed the couple to have been his distant cousins, Beryl and Kenneth, turned to Uncle Frank and queried their absence.

  ‘They’ve been dead for six years,’ Uncle Frank answered matter-of-factly. ‘They drowned on holiday.’

  ‘Well, I never,’ Billy said, and passed on the news to Jean.

  The ten remaining members of the congregation went ahead and sang the hymn, and at its conclusion The Reverend Tinkler read a passage from the Bible. He then closed the Book and took some index cards from the inside pocket of his jacket.

  He’d lost count of the funerals he’d conducted over the years, barely remembered the names of the deceased he’d eulogised, and only ever recalled the number of six-by-four cards each life had warranted. Although, on occasion, a departed loved one had called for fifteen such cards, the average was nearer six, and Lyle’s life had been reduced to two: one which spoke of the man Lyle was, and the other – importantly – of the man Lyle wasn’t.

  The Reverend Tinkler had never met Lyle Bowman and had therefore relied heavily on Billy’s disjointed and elliptical memories of his father for the basis of his address. To ensure that a retelling of Lyle’s life would run for more than three minutes, however, he’d been forced to add stock phrases and throw in a philosophy of life based on personal experience. Even so, and despite several redrafts, he was aware that this wasn’t one of his finer encomiums, and was still troubled by some of the segueing.

  ‘People come and people go in a person’s life,’ The Reverend Tinkler intoned. ‘Some leave memories that bring a smile to our faces long after their lives have ended, while others simply haunt our subconscious like an uninvited guest.’

  This latter classification included his ex-wife Joan who, despite holding a senior position in the Blood Transfusion Unit, had run off with a Jehovah’s Witness.

  ‘Lyle Bowman belongs to the former category,’ The Reverend smiled. ‘He was a good man, a quiet man; a man who sighed a lot and a man who kept himself to himself. He didn’t live life on the grand scale, and neither did he strive to do so.’

  And neither, in fact, did The Reverend Tinkler. A constant source of friction between him and his ex-wife had been his lack of ambition; while Joan had aspired to be the wife of a rural bishop, he’d been more than happy to remain the vicar of a small parish in a northern industrial city.

  ‘Lyle was born here, grew up here and lived his entire life here,’ The Reverend continued.

  ‘He didn’t like cats.

  ‘A bright child, he gained a place at the local grammar school and, on leaving, bought a parrot and went to work for a local firm of accountants. Though no one blamed the parrot, shortly after its purchase Lyle developed a painful form of rheumatoid arthritis and was confined to bed for long periods. Unable to work on a regular basis, the firm of accountants he’d only recently joined terminated his contract – something, I’m glad to say, that wouldn’t happen in this day and age.

  ‘Two years later, however – and once the condition had eased – Lyle found work as a packer in the dress department of a ladies’ mantle manufacturing company, and remained there for the next fifty years. At the time of his retirement, he was not only managing the coat department but was also a director of the company.

  ‘After the parrot died, Lyle gave the cage to the Salvation Army.

  ‘Lyle Bowman will be remembered by some as a particular man, a man who placed as much emphasis on the correct usage of the gerund as he did to wearing a collar and tie or polishing his shoes. Above all, he will be remembered as a family man – a loving husband, father, grandfather and brother – and nothing in life is more pleasing to God than a loving family man.’

  This too had been a source of contention between The Reverend and his ex-wife. Although they’d never actually discussed the subject of children before marrying, he’d naturally assumed that, in due course, they would have a family, and was therefore shocked when Joan had refused point blank to bear him either sons or daughters. Shortly thereafter, she’d also refused to submit to any of his sexual advances, and The Reverend Tinkler was left a reluctant celibate with the beginnings of carpal tunnel syndrome in his right wrist.

  ‘Lyle married late in life to a young woman who accidentally spilt custard over his brown supervisor’s coat. It was a marriage made in Heaven, or as Lyle used to joke, in the staff canteen.’

  There was a ripple of polite laughter – in truth, rather less than The Reverend had hoped for – and he paused for only a moment.

  ‘Mary proved a loving wife,’ he continued, ‘and the happiest years of Lyle’s life were spent in her company. They enjoyed Old-Time dancing, going to performances of Gilbert & Sullivan operas and listening to the music of Jim Reeves.

  ‘Mary didn’t like cats either.

  ‘Sadly, Mary’s death was untimely, and it was left to Lyle to raise their two sons – Billy, who’s sitting here at the front with his wife Jean and daughter Katy; and Gregory, who, unfortunately, can’t be with us today.’

  ‘How come he didn’t mention me by name?’ Uncle Frank asked Billy.

  Billy was in no fit state to reply and ignored the question. Tears welled from his eyes and his body shook silently. The minister noticed Billy’s upset and immediately his own spirits rose. With one card to go, it was obvious that things were going well.

  ‘I mentioned earlier that Lyle lived his life on the small scale,’ The Reverend Tinkler continued. ‘That his death was splashed over the front page o
f the local newspaper is therefore a matter of some irony. Some of you might remember reading the editorial that questioned the nature of a society that abandoned its old people to the margins and left them there to die of loneliness or, in Lyle’s case, turpentine poisoning.

  ‘Billy has asked me to set the record straight. Lyle Bowman was not an alcoholic – and certainly hadn’t been drinking turpentine on the day of his death. He had, in fact, been drinking white spirit, but more to the point had done so accidentally. Lyle Bowman was no toper.

  ‘Lyle had in fact been painting the house before his death and, after mistakenly placing his brush in a glass of liquid antibiotics, had inadvertently drunk the jar of white spirit. It was a mix-up that caused not only his death but – as his brother Frank wryly noted – also ruined a good paintbrush.’

  ‘Now he mentions me, the daft bugger!’ Uncle Frank grumbled. ‘I didn’t want that made public.’

  ‘It goes without saying that Lyle would be with us today if he’d used the zebra crossing that morning. And it’s also more than likely he’d still be here if he’d crossed the road directly, instead of diagonally.

  ‘I don’t know why,’ The Reverend Tinkler mused, ‘but old people tend to cross roads at an angle rather than taking the shortest route – and this is a recipe for disaster. If Lyle’s death is to have any meaning then we, as his friends, have to learn from it and signal its lesson to others.

  ‘Now, can anyone tell me what that lesson is?’

  ‘Don’t get old,’ Uncle Frank chuntered.

  ‘I was rather thinking of something else, Frank,’ The Reverend Tinkler smiled.

  ‘That we should never cross roads diagonally,’ Mrs Turton said primly.

  ‘Bull’s eye, Mrs Turton! Well done!’ The Reverend said, and slowly repeated her words. ‘Never. Cross roads. Diagonally.’

  Uncle Frank glanced at Mrs Turton and scowled.