Echoes of the Dance (24 page)

‘What shall I do?' she asks helplessly. ‘I need her,' and the General puts his arms around her, consoling her as though she is one of the children.

‘You are stronger than you can possibly imagine,' he says. ‘And I am here. For the moment that will have to be enough.'

* * *

Abruptly Kate turned aside and wandered out into the hall. This journey to the past was not going according to plan. She hadn't asked to keep the key of the cottage so that she could brood on the death of her mother or the failure of her marriage to Mark Webster: the cottage had been the refuge to which she'd eventually returned after her separation from Mark and the place where she and Alex had been so happy. It was that year with Alex that she wanted to relive, not the misery of the final period of her marriage. Perhaps, out in the garden, she might find what she was looking for: that golden thread that would connect past and present and future, enabling her to take the next step forward, showing her the way. Hesitating in the doorway, listening to the robin's song, the sun warmed and eased her; she raised her face, eyes closed, remembering. In the heat wave of 1976, a year after her separation from Mark, she'd spent most of her free time in this garden.

She'd met Alex three years earlier, going into his bookshop in the hope of finding an antiquarian print of Plymouth Hoe for Mark's birthday present. It was clear that he'd been attracted to her but clear too that he'd understood that she was married. In the ensuing months she'd seen him from time to time in the Pannier Market and, on one occasion, he'd persuaded her to join him for a cup of coffee in The Galleon, where they'd talked about his trade in antiquarian books and pictures. Though she knew nothing of his work they'd passed a very happy half an hour but the next time they'd met each other she'd had the twins with her and merely exchanged a friendly greeting.

After the final break with Mark, returning to the cottage that had been let for the last year, she'd needed to assess the new situation carefully. Mark had been ready to agree to pay a monthly sum for the twins' upkeep – he had his own reasons for keeping the separation from being made public – and was ready to continue to top up the school fees, two-thirds of which were paid by the Navy. Kate had no wish to create problems at school for the twins by plunging into divorce proceedings – they were settling down well and their friends were all the children of military families – but she'd needed to feel free. At last she'd persuaded her father to lend her enough money to buy Mark out of the cottage – this far, she could be independent of him – but now she must begin to earn enough to support herself and repay the loan. Then she'd seen Alex's advertisement for an assistant in the
Tavistock
Times
.

Even now Kate could recall the trepidation with which she'd answered it and how amazed and delighted she'd been when he'd accepted her application. Six months later she'd begun to fall in love with him.

Sitting on the little bench in the sunshine, Kate took a deep, expectant breath. The tight knot in her heart seemed to loosen a little: this was what she'd hoped for, this unravelling of the events that might help her to understand why something so wonderful had ended so abruptly.

How gently it begins, how kind he is and – oh, what a luxury – how easy to talk to. After the years of silence with Mark, it is Alex's interest in her that is the most seductive element of their relationship. They speak the same language, share the same interests, laugh at the same things and she falls in love with him before she realizes it. She catches herself watching his hands as he touches the old books, looking at his mouth as he talks and smiles, and she begins to experience strange and disturbing emotions.

It becomes clear to her that she hasn't been in love before; that her feelings for Mark have been a romantic reaction to the combination of his darkly handsome looks and the glamour of the whole naval scene of which, elegant in his uniform, he is only a part. The strength of her passion for Alex comes as a shock and she is fearful that rumours of an affair might give Mark grounds for taking the twins away from her: she knows how careful she must be.

Alex goes out of his way to enable her to keep up with the work, taking on part-time assistants so that she can spend the school holidays with the twins, and understanding her problems with balancing the dogs' needs. She is grateful, not only for his kindness but also for his friendship, and she is afraid that he might guess that she is falling in love with him, although it is very clear that he is by no means indifferent to her. Her confusion is made worse, however, by the fact that Alex is divorced and very popular with a number of women – and one woman in particular – who make no secret of their interest in him.

All through that hot summer holiday Kate holds the twins as a shield between her and any possible developments in her relationship with Alex, yet she longs for him dreadfully. His presence has become necessary to her wellbeing and she misses their companionable chats, the shared excitement at the discovery of a valuable old book or print, and those lunchtimes when they would shut up shop and stroll over to the Bedford for sandwiches and beer.

Even the moor brings her no comfort. The drought transforms it into a scorched wasteland: cracks and fissures open in the ground, the streams dry up, and the ponies and sheep crowd into the few remaining areas of shade beneath that shimmering, pitiless glare. Even the skylarks seem to lose heart and only the ravens are in evidence as they strut over the parched grasslands, their stiff-legged gait slow and purpose- less, before taking to the airless heights with dispirited wing-beats. Kate is grateful for the coolness provided by the thick-walled cottage. She and the twins, with the dogs, spend a great deal of time lying on the grass beneath the apple trees. It is a relief when the heat wave ends and the heavy rains fall at last.

The evening of Cass's party: that is when the affair truly begins. How fearful Kate is of appearing in public with Alex as her partner, knowing that so many of the guests will be Mark's fellow officers with their wives, and how persuasive Cass is! When Kate opens the cottage door to see Alex waiting for her, elegant, tall and unfamiliar in his dinner jacket, she is panic-stricken, feeling ill-at-ease at being thrust back into the social world as an unattached woman: still fearful that rumours will reach Mark.

When she says lightly: ‘You look very dashing,' and he replies thoughtfully: ‘And you look just as I thought you would,' she immediately feels gauche and underdressed in her black velvet skirt and silk shirt. She thinks again of his reputation, of those women who pursue him, and wishes that she'd taken Cass up on her offer of a new outfit. It is so easy, she reflects, to carry the hang-ups of a first relationship into the next one. The comradely atmosphere of the shop has fled and she is supersensitive to his glance and touch.

At least, she thinks, there will be plenty of people. Safety in numbers.

She is right: typically of Cass there are plots and counterplots, flirtations and all kinds of subterfuge, and Kate and Alex have no chance to be alone together.

‘Well, they certainly know how to give a party,' Alex says afterwards as he drives her home. ‘It was so nice to be with you in a non-working situation. May we do it again?'

‘It was fun,' Kate admits. Pleasantly relaxed, having had rather more than usual to drink, her emotions are heightened and disturbed by the atmosphere of the party. For a blissful moment she forgets about being married, forgets about her reputation or how gossip or divorce might affect the twins. She touches his knee lightly. ‘Thank you for coming.'

He covers her hand with his own and holds it. ‘It's a wonderful night,' he says. ‘The moon's up. We could take the Princetown road and go up on to the tops. The moor looks so unearthly by moonlight.'

They drive in silence until Alex stops the car on Walk-hampton Common and switches off the engine. The flat white disc of the moon bleaches everything of colour: the boulders and the grass, sparkling in the grip of frost, create a silvery white background against which gorse bushes and thorn trees are etched black.

‘Shall we get out?' he suggests. ‘I've got a rug somewhere. You could wrap yourself in that. The air will be unbelievable.'

They climb out of the car and he folds a rug about her, holding her close against his side; their breath smokes in the sharp, singing air and the stars glitter with such brilliance that it seems that they too must be touched by the frost.

‘I can't imagine a better time or place to tell you that I think I love you,' he says. ‘I know you're not free. I know there are all sorts of problems. But do you want to try to resolve them so that we can have a chance? Or is it still too soon for you?'

Her teeth chatter – partly from the cold, partly with excitement – and he holds her closer, turning her chin up with his free hand.

‘I'm afraid,' she says, almost inaudibly. ‘If I start, I'm afraid I shan't know how to stop.'

‘That's what I thought,' he says. He bends to kiss her, and the rug and her shawl fall unheeded to the ground as they hold each other. They are disturbed when a heavy lorry lumbers by on the road below them, the driver banging derisively on his horn, and at last they draw apart. She begins to laugh, her eyes blind with moonlight, shivering in her thin silk shirt, and Alex picks up the shawl and rug, wrapping them around her.

‘Come on,' he says. ‘I'm going to take you home.'

The insistent double ring announcing a text message on her mobile telephone wrenched Kate out of her daydream and she sat quite still for a moment, resentful at being disturbed at such a moment, just when she'd begun to find her way back into the past. She took her phone from her pocket and read the message. It was from Gemma.

‘How R U. Wd it b OK 4 U 2 have the twins 4 the w/e.'

Kate stared at the message, frowning a little. It was not unusual for her to look after the twins but such a request was not normally made with such brevity. Anxiety began to crowd out her memories and she put the phone back in her pocket and got to her feet. She would come back later, she decided, after she'd spoken to Gemma and dealt with Michael.

Perhaps she could persuade him to allow her to keep the key for a little while longer. She locked the front door carefully, testing the handle so as to be certain, and paused at the gate to look back at the cottage as though promising herself that she would return soon.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

There were three messages on the answerphone. Leaving the kitchen door open to the warm June sunshine, throwing her bag onto a chair, Kate pressed the button and waited. The first message was from Roly.

‘Hello, Kate. How are things with you? I've just put Mim on the train to London and Daisy went back to Bath yesterday so the place seems extraordinarily empty. Any chance that you might manage lunch this week? I'll wait to hear from you.'

Michael's was next.

‘Just confirming that I'll be with you at three o'clock. No problem with the key for today so I'll pick it up when I see you. Bye.'

The third message was from Gemma: her voice had a breathless, distracted quality, though she was clearly making an effort to sound normal, and Kate tensed as she listened.

‘Hi, Kate. It's Gemma. Are you there . . . ? No, probably not. Um, the thing is, I was wondering if you could possibly manage to cope with the twins this weekend. It's just . . . I was hoping that Guy and I could . . . well, you know, have a bit of time on our own. Look, I'll try your mobile, only I need to know soon. Sorry, this sounds a bit crazy. I'll try again later. I hope you're OK?'

This last enquiry was so patently an afterthought that Kate smiled sympathetically, despite her anxiety: poor Gemma sounded too fraught for the usual niceties. Kate hastened to dial her number and Gemma answered almost immediately.

‘Oh, Kate, thanks for calling back. Did you get my text message?'

‘I did. Both messages, in fact. I'd love to have the twins, you know I would.'

‘Oh, that's fantastic. It's just that I think Guy and I need some time on our own. You know what it's like?'

‘Oh, yes. I know what it's like. Shall you be going away?'

‘No. No, I don't think so. Well, perhaps on the boat if the weather stays fine.'

‘That sounds fun. Do you want me to pick the twins up?'

‘No! I mean, thanks but I can bring them over. Could you manage from Friday after school until tea-time on Sunday?'

‘Of course I can, my darling. It'll be great fun. I'll see you all on Friday, then?'

‘It'll probably be just me and the twins. Guy is . . . Guy has rather a lot on this week.'

‘Fine. Well, let me know if there's anything special I should get in. About five, then?'

‘That'll be great. Thanks, Kate. I'm really grateful.'

Refusing to allow herself to brood over certain aspects of the conversation, Kate telephoned Roly. He took much longer to answer and Kate imagined him hurrying from the yard, wading through the dogs, hoping the caller wouldn't hang up before he could reach the handset. She was just deciding that he must be out when there was a click.

‘Hello,' he said rather breathlessly. ‘Hello?'