A Winter Bride (12 page)

‘Soon you will have one of these,’ Carol said, looking at Katy with love.

‘Actually, Alistair wants three,’ Nell said. She checked her watch. ‘I have to be going. May’s cooking dinner. You know what she’s like if you’re late. She takes it as a personal insult if you’re not at the table when the meal is at its peak of perfection.’

The Rutherford’s house was only a five-minute walk from Carol’s. Late afternoon, five o’clock sparrows bickered in suburban hedges, and the drifting smells of Sunday cooking filled the air. This was Nell’s favourite time of day. She watched her feet moving over the pavement in their new patent leather Italian shoes with long pointed toes. She loved her winkle-pickers and was a little miffed that Carol hadn’t mentioned them. Mostly, though, she thought about her mother. She’d have been expecting a call. Not that she would have sat by the phone. She’d have glanced at it hopefully every time she passed it in the hall. She wouldn’t mention her disappointment at its silence to Stewart, though.

May was at the window when Nell arrived. She waved, beckoned Nell in.

‘Come away in. We’ve been wondering if you’d got lost. Oh, thems lovely shoes. Did you buy them in Italy? I’ve done a lovely ham with a honey glaze. We’ll have it with salad and some white wine. There’s chocolate mousse for after.’

She held Nell by the shoulders, admiring her for a few seconds, then kissed her. ‘I’ve missed you.’

The family was gathered in the living room, and a fire crackled in the grate. Alistair patted the sofa. ‘Here,’ he said, ‘beside me.’ He put his arm round her, pulled her to him.

The house was full of the sweet smell of May’s ham. May and Harry fussed over her, and Harry fetched her a glass of Italian wine. Thoughts of Nancy started to slip away.

Nell was surprised to see Johnny in the room. He was watching a football match on television, drinking beer.

‘Thought you’d gone fishing,’ she said.

‘I did. Now I’m back. Popped in here for a beer and to say hello. How’s my wife, anyway?’

‘She’s a bit depressed at being on her own all day. And she’d burned your dinner.’

Johnny turned to May. ‘In that case I’ll stay to eat.’

May said that was grand. She nodded to Harry. ‘Time for the champagne.’

Harry brought the bottle from the kitchen along with five flutes.

‘We’re celebrating,’ said May.

Harry opened the champagne, filled the glasses and handed them round. Johnny protested that he was already drinking beer.

‘You’ll put it aside and raise a glass with the rest of us,’ said May. ‘We’re drinking a toast to our new venture.’

Alistair said he’d thought they were celebrating the return of the honeymooners.

‘No,’ said May. ‘Not that. Well, a little bit. But we’ve been busy when you were away. We’ve bought a hotel.’

‘You’ve what?’ said Alistair.

‘You heard,’ said May. ‘We’re going into the hotel business. There’s money there. It’s going to be a family business, with everyone involved. It’ll be a restaurant first. Then we’ll expand into having staying guests. We’re all going to have to muck in. But it’ll be the best hotel in the country. Luxury bedrooms, top cuisine, a swimming pool. Oh, it’ll have everything. I’ve got it all planned.’

Johnny, Alistair and Nell were too stunned to speak. Even if they did have misgivings, they knew not to mention them. May was giving them ‘the glare’. It was a look that told all doubters to hold their tongue.

Harry raised his glass. ‘To the hotel and to the Rutherfords.’

They held up their glasses and shouted, ‘To the Rutherfords.’ They drank. Harry took the bottle round the room. ‘Top up? Top up?’

‘A hotel,’ said Nell. ‘Goodness.’ Her mind filled with dreams of plush carpets, glistening rows of exotic bottles on shelves behind dark mahogany bars, velvet-covered chairs, a candlelit dining room with a single white rose on every table, sophisticated diners, and a swimming pool – deep blue and tempting. It would be like the sumptuous hotels she’d seen in the movies. The sort of place films stars haunted. Audrey Hepburn and Rock Hudson might turn up there. Unlikely, but Nell was an unlikely dreamer. She was bedazzled. Thoughts of her mother vanished.

Chapter Eleven

Carol

Carol knew where Johnny was, and why he didn’t come home. He’d be at his mother’s house; the food was better there. No doubt Nell would have told him that she’d burned the roast beef.

Johnny would return sometime after ten, but he wouldn’t spend time with her, chatting, telling her about his day. He’d go straight to bed. She’d sit up till after midnight, watching television or reading. They rarely communicated. Almost as soon as they’d married, they ran out of things to say to one another. But then, when Carol thought about it, they never had spoken much. She realised that her relationship with Johnny hadn’t been about conversation. When they were alone together they’d been too busy making love to chat. On dates they’d gone to the pub where Johnny was a regular. He’d talk to his mates about sport and cars. She sat beside him looking beautiful. This was all he asked of her. But she couldn’t complain; all she asked of him was that he was so good-looking girls in the pub would gaze at him and envy her.

She carried Katy to the kitchen where she fed her.

‘Don’t think your dad’s coming home anytime soon. It’s just us again. You’d think they’d invite us round if they’re celebrating the return of Nell and Alistair. But they didn’t.’

She scooped a spoonful of mushy cauliflower cheese into Katy’s mouth. ‘Made it myself. What do you think?’

The child stared at her and opened her mouth at the approaching loaded spoon.

‘We’ll take that as an excellent, then,’ said Carol. ‘Awfully quiet here. I think we should put the radio on.’ She stuffed a third spoonful into Katy’s mouth, got up and switched on the radio then returned to the task in hand. ‘Didn’t think you’d be so hungry.’ She sighed then apologised. ‘Sorry, huge sigh. It isn’t you. I’m just not happy. One, your father’s hardly ever here. Two, when he is here he’s sleeping.’ She leaned towards her daughter. ‘You don’t mind me dumping all this on you, I hope, only I’ve nobody to talk to. You know what the problem is, don’t you? He’s still a kid. And, after having you, I became a woman. That’s the problem.’

Katy grinned. She didn’t talk much yet but was a happy baby.

‘You think that’s funny? I think it’s a bit dire. There’s mushy apples for pudding. Your father gets dressed up every Friday and off he goes into the night looking for a good time like he was seventeen. And don’t tell me there aren’t women involved in this good time. There are. There has to be.’

She fed Katy the puréed apples and told her, ‘I don’t think there’s any actual sex. Don’t repeat that word to either of your grannies. But there will be fondling and kissing. He needs constant reassurance that he’s still good-looking.’ She absently ate a couple of spoonfuls of apples. ‘I can’t complain about money, though. He gives me more than enough.’

Every Friday evening, before he went out on the town, Johnny would take a wad of notes from his pocket, peel off several ten-pound notes and give them to Carol.

Once she’d suggested they open a bank account and start saving.

‘What for?’ Johnny had wanted to know.

‘For a house.’

‘We’ve got a house.’

‘One day we might need a bigger one.’

He had shaken his head. ‘No we won’t.’

Carol had pointed out that they might have more children. ‘A brother or sister for Katy.’

‘We’ve got three bedrooms. That’s enough for any family.’

Carol had gone on to suggest they might need to replace the carpets and the sofa one day. ‘To be honest, I don’t like them. I want to pick my own furniture.’

He’d told her that his mother had picked their furniture and would be hurt if they threw it out and bought something new. ‘I’m not going to get on the wrong side of my mother, and neither are you. I don’t like this house either. It’s not what I’d have chosen. But then, I don’t like my job. It was always assumed I’d work with my dad. Nobody asked me what I wanted to do. I hate selling cars.’

Carol had asked what he’d wanted to do.

‘Something in sport. Perhaps a physical education teacher or a coach. Look, none of this is what I wanted. But I did the right thing. I married you, and I do love my little girl. So here we are. The hideous carpets don’t bother me as much as they do you. I’ve been living with my mother’s taste all my life.’

Carol had pointed out that if he’d sorted the sofa and the carpets, faced up to May, maybe he’d be able to sort out the rest of his life. ‘Your job, for example.’

He’d waved the suggestion away. ‘Here’s the deal. We stay here. We suffer the carpets and the sofa. Friday nights I go out. I need to relax. I give you money. You can buy what you want. Only no new houses, no new furniture and no bank accounts. You pay for everything with cash. OK?’

‘OK,’ she’d agreed. But it was only said quietly to avoid an argument.

She removed Katy’s bib, wiped her mouth, heaved her from her high chair and took her back to the living room. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘Johnny is still a kid. He’s angry. You can see it in the way he walks and the way he prowls about the house or sits in front of the television drinking beer. He even mumbles furiously in his sleep. And it’s why he buys all the clothes. Every week a new shirt or shoes or trousers. He’s clinging to his time as a single guy.’ She put Katy down on the rug and handed her several bright red bricks. ‘Build me something. A new house would be good. Maybe you’ll grow up to be an architect. You can do anything you want when you’re big – just don’t get pregnant before you’re married.’

She poured some of the wine she’d brought out to christen the new glasses. ‘Good glasses. They’re just about the only thing in this house that I like. Did you see Nell’s new shoes? God, they’re lovely. Wish they were mine. Still, I didn’t mention them. Didn’t say they were great. God, I’m such a bitch. I’m jealous of my best friend and her life and her new husband.’

She got down on the floor beside Katy and put one brick on top of another. ‘Now you put one on top of my one.’

Katy swept the brick away. ‘Down!’ she cried jubilantly.

‘Ah,’ said Carol, ‘you’re feeling destructive. Well, that’s OK. Gets rid of the anger. Johnny should do that – express his rage instead of bottling it up. You know what’s going to happen, don’t you? He’s going to explode one day. Or I might explode. One way or another an explosion is coming.’

Chapter Twelve

Isn’t Life Fabulous?

The hotel was not as Nell had imagined. But then, nothing ever was. She’d dreamed of a huge mansion fronted by spreading lush lawns either side of a long drive. But this was an old coaching inn set a little bit back from the main road. It looked lonely.

The white walls were now grey, a searing black damp stain rose from the base of the front wall up to the first floor windows. There were tiles missing from the roof, stringy ivy crawled past the main door, paint peeled from the window frames, the small car-parking area at the front of the inn was layered with scruffy gravel. May declared it beautiful, and since nobody disagreed with her – they didn’t dare – she assumed everyone thought so too.

Stepping inside, the word that came to Nell’s mind was rubble. She was reminded of the aftermath in disaster movies. That moment when the survivors of some horrendous explosion emerge from a collapsed building, look round at the destruction, scarcely able to believe they are still alive and not sure, really, if they want to be among the living if this was what they had to contend with.

What Nell saw was dust. A dense cloud floated in the few rays of sunlight that came from the broken windows. There was a scattering of abandoned furniture – bar stools, tables, tattered lamps – and more dust. A forlorn moth-eaten stag’s head loomed over the doorway. A couple of pigeons perched on one of the exposed beams that stretched overhead from one end of the room to the other. They cocked their heads, eyed the intruders with suspicion. After all, they’d had the place to themselves for the past seven years.

Everyone was here. May had insisted the whole family come with her for her first inspection of the new property. She’d brought a picnic.

‘It’s a bit run down,’ observed Nell.

‘Of course it is,’ said May. ‘That’s why it was so cheap. I’m not daft.’

She turned a full circle, arms spread. ‘This area will be the bar, with a big roaring log fire and a fine range of whiskies. Then through there—’ she pointed to a room off the one they were in ‘—will be the dining room. It’ll be exclusive. You’ll have to book a table in advance. The bedrooms, all done out in luxury, will be upstairs, of course.’ She looked up, contemplating the gorgeousness to come. Her entourage – Harry, Johnny, Carol, Alistair and Nell – followed her gaze, but saw only the pigeons and a ceiling with lumps of plaster missing. ‘It’s going to be lovely.’

She walked past the bar, opened a door at the back of the room. ‘This is the kitchen and out there’s the garden. There will be a covered walkway leading from the French windows in the residents’ quarter to the swimming pool.’

The kitchen was small. There was a grease-encrusted commercial range, a long table and beside the door was a selection of bins. The garden outside was mostly brambles and nettles.

Nell wasn’t impressed. ‘What are you going to call the place?’

‘Something French,’ said May. ‘France is where you get the best cuisine. People will be expecting that sort of food. Chateau House, I thought.’

Alistair looked thoughtful. ‘Chateau means big house in French. So you’re calling your hotel House House?’

May gave him the glare, and then continued enthusing. She folded her arms, looked round and announced, ‘I have a vision.’

Alistair followed her gaze and said, ‘A vision is good. You’ve got to have a vision.’

‘Yes,’ said May. ‘I have a vision. It’ll make us a pile when we get going.’

‘You’ll need a lot of staff,’ said Nell, ‘for the bar, dining room and kitchen, as well as people to look after the bedrooms – chambermaids and the like.’

‘We’ll keep it in the family,’ said May. ‘There are Alistair’s aunts, uncles and cousins. There’s you and Carol. We’ll manage. I’ve got it all sorted in my head.’ She tapped the side of the head, proving how sorted it was up there.