Jigsaw (6 page)

They lingered over coffee and
petits fours,
and it was after eleven when they rose to leave. To Rona's embarrassment, Gavin insisted on paying for her meal.

‘It's no big deal, for heaven's sake,' he insisted, refusing her attempts to contribute. ‘Anyway, you added to our enjoyment, didn't she, Maggie?'

‘Of course she did.' Magda kissed Rona's cheek lightly. ‘Love to the family, and let me know how the Buckford project proceeds.'

They separated on the pavement, the Ridgeways to collect their car and Rona, declining their offer of a lift, to walk home with Gus.

‘Magda and Gavin are back,' she told Max when, as always, he phoned to say good night. ‘They came into Dino's, so we sat together.'

‘Has Gavin recovered from that bug?'

‘Yes, he seems fine. They've had a fantastic holiday, by all accounts, in South America and the States. Do you know, Max, I've just worked out that I've known Magda nearly thirty years! Isn't that frightening? I can still remember her first day at school; Sally Tompkins pulled her pigtails, and Magda went for her!'

Max laughed. ‘And she's been going for people ever since!'

Rona remembered his words as she sat reading in bed, and, laying down her book, she let her thoughts drift back across the years to her first meeting with Magda, when they were both ten years old. She'd been a new girl at the beginning of the summer term, and consequently had to brave a class where everyone else knew each other. However, Rona's initial twinge of sympathy rapidly dissipated as it became clear the newcomer could fend for herself. After the episode with Sally, Magda seemed to regard them all as potential enemies and made no attempt to form friendships. Even then, she stood out from the others, in the way she spoke as much as in her looks. Thinking back, Rona realized that her clear diction and impeccable grammar came from having learned English as a second language.

The turning point came one day when Lindsey had been kept at home with earache, and Rona just happened to walk out of the school gates alongside Magda. Among the familiar, homely figures of the other mothers was an exotic creature in scarlet skirt and white lacy top who, to Rona's alarm, swept down upon them, catching them both up in her enthusiastic embrace.

‘Ah,
cara
, this is one of your friends?' She bent down to smile into Rona's face. ‘You will come home for tea, yes? There are some
copate
, which I am sure you will enjoy.'

Rona glanced wildly at Magda, whose face was as scarlet as her mother's skirt. ‘Mama—' she began, but her mother was already shepherding them both down the road like a mother hen with her chicks. ‘We will telephone to your mother and tell her where you are,' she declared. ‘Then she will not worry, no?' She had said
mahzzer
and
wahrry
.

Magda, meanwhile, was in a turmoil of embarrassment. ‘Mama is Italian,' she whispered to Rona, as though that explained everything.

And it probably did. Over the following months Rona came to idolize Paola King, revelling in her vibrant colours, her full-bellied laugh and her obvious joy in life, all of which were such a stark contrast to her own mother. The Kings' house was a semi-detached, to a passer-by no different from its neighbours; but once inside it became, to Rona's young eyes, an Aladdin's cave. The furniture was subtly foreign, religious pictures and crucifixes hung on the walls, and the floors were spread with brightly coloured rugs instead of carpets. And overlaying it all was its distinctive aroma of exotic breads and pastries, rich meat sauces and succulent pastas.

It became her retreat from teenage angst, disagreements with her mother, exam nerves. With or without Magda, Paola always welcomed her, listened with sympathy to her problems, and sat her down at the kitchen table to whatever delicacy she was in the process of making. The magic always worked, and an hour or so later, Rona would return home with her equilibrium restored, able to face the world again. Looking back, she saw that those times with Paola were some of the most formative of her adolescence, and the only ones she'd not shared with Lindsey. It was only much later that she'd wondered whether Magda's reserve had been a subconscious reaction to her mother's gregariousness.

On that first visit she had duly made her phone call, and Avril, having established she was only in the adjacent street, had raised no objection to her delayed return. ‘As long as you do your homework,' she'd added as an afterthought. Then Rona was seated at the table opposite Magda and given a bright-blue mug of milk and the promised
copate,
which turned out to be delicious little wafer-like cakes.

‘I'm so glad to meet a friend of Magdalena,' Paola declared, joining them at the table and studying Rona with frank interest. ‘She does not make friends easily, eh,
cara mia
? I worry about that.'

‘But Magda has lots of friends,' Rona said, with more loyalty than truth, and was rewarded with a flash of gratitude.

‘That is so? I am so happy to hear it! My husband always say I fuss too much.'

‘Is he Italian too?' Rona asked, gaining confidence.

‘No, he is as English as you are. We met when he was working in Italy, but he has been moved back here now.' Mrs King glanced ruefully at the cloudy sky outside the window. ‘I miss the sunshine,' she said.

And that was how it began. Rona's obvious appreciation of her mother and her home, not to mention her support on the subject of friends, penetrated Magda's prickliness and they did indeed become friends and, apart from a clash or two, had remained so ever since.

Rona smiled sleepily, rearranged her pillow, and turned out the light.

Avril Parish stood at the kitchen sink and stared unseeingly through the window. Tom had already left for work, with that air of suppressed eagerness that both hurt and infuriated her. She knew, though he hadn't said so, that he was dreading his retirement – and so, heaven knew, was she. There were so many things they hadn't discussed. Would she be expected to be home each day to cook his lunch? What of her trips to town, her bridge, her hours at the charity shop? Would she be forced to ‘retire' simply because he had?

She turned on the taps, remembering a similar panic when the girls left home for university. How, she'd wondered, would she face the long evenings when Tom dozed over his paper, without their lively chatter to enliven them? Still, the courses had been of limited duration and she was proud of her daughters' achievements. The sense of rejection came later when, though both were working in Marsborough, they elected to share a flat instead of living at home. But they'd always been as thick as thieves, whispering secrets together from early childhood and, whether deliberately or not, making her feel excluded.

She squeezed in the washing-up liquid, her mind still broodingly on her daughters. They hadn't turned out as she'd expected. In fact, nothing had. To start with, they were too independent by half. Rona's downright refusal to take Max's name on her marriage had been bad enough – and raised not a few eyebrows at the bridge club – but when they decided to live apart half the week, she gave up on them. No amount of explanation could make her accept the logic, though Tom, after the initial shock, had come round to it. And admittedly they still seemed happy together. Despite what Lindsey termed their ‘semi-detachment', at least they hadn't formally separated, as Lindsey herself had from Hugh.

And that was another bone of contention, Avril thought, determinedly scrubbing at a pan. God knows, Lindsey had put them all through it during the lead-up to her divorce – tantrums, storms of tears, total unreasonableness. But she'd come through it, been offered promotion in her job, and now had her own nice little flat out at Fairhaven. And into this restored harmony Hugh had had the damned nerve to reappear. Even more unbelievably, Lindsey had let him, arousing in her mother an overpowering urge to shake her.

‘Haven't you any pride at all?' she had ranted. ‘You let that man walk all over you! If you've forgotten what he put you through last time, you've a shorter memory than the rest of us.'

Lindsey's mouth had set in the familiar mutinous line. ‘He comes up on my terms, Mum. I know what I'm doing. I've never said I'll take him back.'

‘He's as good as back already. Well, don't expect us to pick up the pieces next time, that's all I ask.'

‘Don't keep on at her, love,' Tom had said later, in his maddeningly patient way. ‘You'll only make her more determined to go her own way.'

‘What makes you think she pays a blind bit of notice to anything I say?' she'd retorted. ‘I'm only her mother.'

He had put an arm round her waist. ‘I know you're worried for her – so am I. But we learned early on, didn't we, that's not the way to win the twins round. They're apt to bolt if too much pressure is applied. We worried about Rona, too, but everything seems to be going swimmingly.'

‘If that's what you call spending only half the week with your husband.' Even as she said it, Avril felt a twist of unacknowledged envy, which only added to her irritation. ‘
Why
have they turned out like this?' she'd cried, shrugging away from his arm. ‘It's not the way we brought them up.'

But he had only shaken his head and wandered out of the room. Well, they'd be here this evening, Rona, Max and Lindsey, though thankfully not Hugh. And if she didn't get a move on, the butcher would have sold out of the best cuts of beef. Avril tipped the foamy water out of the bowl, dried her hands, and reached for her old cardigan.
Sufficient unto the day,
she thought gloomily as she let herself out of the house.

Nuala was shampooing the spare-room carpet when the phone rang and, propping the machine against the wall, she went into her bedroom and picked up the extension, her mind still on preparations for her guest.

‘Hello?' she said.

‘Well, hello there. How are things?'

A wave of heat suffused her and her hand tightened on the phone. ‘Clive?' she stammered.

‘The very same. Nice to hear your voice after all this time.'

‘I wish I could say the same,' she retorted, shock giving way to anger. ‘What do you want, Clive?'

‘Just phoning to see how you and Will are.'

‘After three years?'

He gave a low laugh. ‘I was warned off by your father, if you remember. “Never darken our doors again” and all the rest of it. So I didn't darken your phone, either.'

‘Where are you?' she asked evenly.

‘In Chilswood at the moment, but I've no permanent base.'

‘Very wise.'

‘Don't be like that, sweetheart. Point is, I want to ask a favour.'

‘Ah!'

‘Nothing drastic, just a bit of storage space. With being on the move, I need somewhere to leave a few things for a while.'

‘What kind of things?'

‘Just a couple of suitcases. If I dump them in the spare room, they won't be in anyone's way.'

‘That's where you're wrong; I have a paying guest coming next week.'

There was a brief silence. Then he said, ‘Pull the other one.'

‘I'm not the one who tells lies, Clive.'

‘You're actually going to have someone living in?'

‘Yes.' No need to tell him it was only for four weeks.

‘A man?' There was suspicion in his voice.

‘What's it to you?' But it was pointless being childish, and she added, ‘Actually, it's a woman. A writer.'

‘Well, I'm sure she wouldn't object to the odd suitcase on top of the wardrobe.'

‘She might not, but I would. I don't want anything of yours here, Clive. For all I know, they could be full of drugs or stolen goods.'

He gave a mirthless laugh. ‘You've too much imagination, my love, that's your trouble. It's all perfectly innocuous, I assure you; I just—'

‘Then put them in a left-luggage locker,' she said crisply. ‘I have to go, I'm busy. Please don't call again.'

She put the phone down and stood, heart hammering, looking round the bedroom she'd once shared with her husband. God, he was
still
her husband! She tended to forget that. At the time of his departure she'd been too traumatized to face divorce proceedings, and as the months passed and nothing was heard from him, she'd kept putting it off. In any case, she hadn't known how to contact him. Now he'd turned up again, all the old fears came back. Perhaps she should—

‘Nuala? Did I hear the phone? I'm expecting a call.'

She went on to the landing and looked down at her father standing in the hall.

His voice sharpened. ‘What is it, girl? You're as white as a sheet.'

‘That was Clive, Dad.'

He stiffened, leaning more heavily on his Zimmer. ‘What in God's name did he want?'

‘To use us as a left-luggage office.'

‘For what?'

‘Some suitcases, contents unspecified. He suggested leaving them in the spare room, “out of the way”. I told him it was impossible.'

Jack Stanton was silent for a minute. Then he asked, ‘How did he sound?'

‘The same as ever.'

‘He didn't – threaten you in any way?'

‘I didn't give him the chance.'

The old man shook his head. ‘I don't like it, him surfacing like that. It can only mean trouble. Suppose he doesn't take no for an answer?'

‘We'll face that hurdle when we come to it. In the meantime, though, I'll go and see Frank Jeffries and start divorce proceedings. That should nip it in the bud.'

‘He'd still have access to Will.'

‘He's never made the slightest attempt to see him,' Nuala said hotly. ‘Why should he now?'

‘To cause problems,' Jack Stanton answered flatly.

She shrugged. ‘I've wasted enough of my life worrying about Clive, Dad; I'm not going to let him get to me again. Now, I'm going to finish cleaning this carpet and then I'll see about lunch. OK?'