Learning to Dance (26 page)

She said, out of the blue, surprising herself, ‘I really like her, Matt … I’m so … pleased.’ It was inadequate, and
she added, ‘She’s strong and gentle and fun.’ He reached a hand to cover hers and, even more unexpectedly, she felt her throat contract against a sob. She tried to retrieve their usual lightheartedness. ‘It’s great that you’re coming home again, Matt.’

‘Well, you can’t blame Martha for that, Mum! Len’s been negotiating at arm’s length for ages to get a foothold in Bristol. He’s always had a complex about kidnapping us at a tender age!’

‘Oh my goodness – and he was actually rescuing you. Thank God for Len! How come you kept it such a dark secret?’

‘It was just before Gran had her stroke, if you remember. You must have known something was wrong with her, you were there nearly all the time. Dad thought it best not to tell you anything about it.’

‘Oh, he did, did he? I wish he hadn’t. I remember feeling horribly cut off.’

He said nothing to that; he finished his egg and sat back apparently replete.

She lifted her shoulders in a brief shrug. ‘Well, I can’t blame Martha for that, can I?’

‘It wouldn’t have happened that way if Martha had known. She would have told you. She believes in things being in the open – however painful and embarrassing that might be.’

She thought of Naomi and nodded. ‘True.’

He looked down and said awkwardly, ‘Mum. I know we’ve lost out over these last ten years. And I know nothing stays the same. But … all this business with Dad … you’re all right now, are you?’

She nodded. ‘Of course. It was … let’s say it was difficult. After Gran died I went into some kind of depression; I
realize now that Dad was ill as well as depressed.’ She smiled. ‘Actually, it’s so obvious that he would have gone to you to sort himself out. At the time …’ She hesitated, remembering. ‘I suppose I was angry.’ She shook her head. ‘I don’t know, Matt. I wrote off the idea of Dad going to you because none of you got in touch—’

‘Mum, honestly, if you’d heard him … he made us promise—’

‘I know, I know.’ She smiled again and reached for his hand. ‘How about putting it all behind us? Lots of new things happening – it shouldn’t be too difficult, should it?’

Matt visibly relaxed. ‘Not now. You’re back. It’ll be all right now.’ He turned his hand within hers then shook them both. ‘Sorry to be so … I don’t know. I feel embarrassed now. Don’t laugh – yesterday I even found I was trying to blame that crazy Hausmann! When you talked about his stuff – made Martha cry – you were making allowances for him that I felt you hadn’t done for Dad!’

She said soberly, ‘He was the one who saved Dad, remember.’

‘I know. If it hadn’t been for the weather he was going to bring you over; he knew Dad would recover if you were there.’ He freed his hand and waved it helplessly. ‘He knew you’d put it right. Like you always do.’ He gave her an upside-down smile. ‘He knows you sort of intuitively, somehow. Everyone thinks Dad is the one who runs everything, and of course he does on one level. But you are the one who makes everything work. When you arrived at Taunton last week I knew you’d make it work again, and so did he. And then … and then … when Dad was really improving, and you and me were … it was like old times. I couldn’t wait to tell you about Martha. We were all laughing together, weren’t we?
Then Robert the Grim turned up, and I suddenly saw him as a threat.’

She wondered whether Jack felt the same way. She forced a laugh. ‘He is mainly concerned about Dad. I think they might have a pact to keep each other alive and fairly sane!’

‘Possibly. But, Mum, it really is primitive over there. I wasn’t making that up. And if you do go it will be coming to the end of autumn – gales galore.’

‘Dad wants to go, darling. He really does. And I think it would be good to be away when Len and Toby are here and everything is happening. Dad has got something new to work on. He needs to think it through. You know how it is when he gets his teeth into something.’

He nodded reluctantly. ‘It all seems a bit crazy now, doesn’t it? Dad in the outback and you in your Gothic castle. From the bits you’ve told us it all sounds like a French farce!’

She burst out laughing. ‘Actually it was a bit like a French farce. And it certainly was a Gothic castle, full of passages and unexpected rooms. There were only seven of us, plus the driver of the coach, and one couple were really working on creating romantic situations …’

She came and sat down again, and in the middle of telling him about Stanley and Jennifer, she started to cry. He was appalled and knelt by her, pulling her head on to his shoulder and ruffling her Shirley Temple curls.

‘But it was lovely, Mum – surely you saw that, too?’

She raised her head. ‘Of course I did – and I am so glad you are seeing it, too! It bodes well for your happiness, love. Sometimes you actually have to work at being in love.’

‘May I tell Martha about those two? She would love it. The thought of them dancing in the dark—’

‘The orangery was full of candlelight.’

‘Yes, but they were still dancing in the dark, weren’t they?’ He grinned at her and let her wipe her face with a tissue. ‘Just like all of us.’

That started her off again, just as Jack appeared at the kitchen door. Matt stood up and almost pushed his father into a chair and began telling him about Stanley and Jennifer Markham. And then made more tea. After they had finished with the story, they were all smiling. Judith lifted her mug and suggested a toast.

‘To Castle Dove and all who sail in her!’

They echoed her solemnly.

Later she went upstairs with Jack and sat on the laundry box while he shaved. He protested gently, ‘Jude, you know I can manage.’

‘It’s whether
I
can manage! Matt has been making enquiries. I have to tell you, because we must try to tell the same story!’ She laughed, trying to make it sound comic. ‘I’ve shifted the blame from Martha and put it on the stress of Mum’s death – she wouldn’t mind one bit. Then – as you know – I changed the subject to Castle Dove.’

He was silent, staring at her. Eventually he nodded and turned back to the mirror. ‘I didn’t know about the orangery incident. That was rather special. Robert didn’t mention it – nor the Lorna Doone Project!’ He grinned at his own reflection.

‘He hasn’t had an opportunity to talk to you properly. He was speechless … it was quite a moment, in fact.’ She paused, then confessed. ‘I cried, actually.’

He stopped ‘scrapin’ his face’, as she had called it when she had first watched him shaving, and looked at her, concerned. She shrugged. ‘Can’t you remember being almost fifty years old?’

‘Hey! You sound like a cheeky schoolgirl – I blame Martha Gifford!’

She laughed inordinately. ‘Oh, Jack, she’s really nice – imagine sticking with someone from the age of four.’

He finished beneath his chin, rinsed his razor and laid it carefully aside, then sat on the stool. ‘We would have done, if we’d met that soon.’ He looked at her; she wondered how a human face could reveal such sadness. ‘I threw it all away, Jude. I have spent so much of my life showing what fools men and women can be, and it turns out that I am the biggest fool of them all.’

She shook her head. ‘What about that woman called Judith Denman? She was guilty of overdoing the nesting bit, surely? She should have gone to that party, Jack.’

He shook his head despairingly. ‘If I’d told you … I’d got into the habit of trying to shield you … oh, it’s so absurd—’

‘No – no, it’s not, Jack. But I need to know things like that. Everything between us has to be in the open now. How can we forgive each other if we don’t know what there is to forgive? I took on the role of homemaker, and when the boys left for no apparent reason that made any sense to me, I almost embraced Mum’s illness. You were still with me on that. But insidiously we were moving apart – the Australian visits especially. And Naomi, she was my friend, yet all we had in common was that she had nursed her husband. I knew nothing about that time. I just assumed she was devoted and kind. Yet she told me that widows were not welcome into married households – and that’s not true, Jack. But it was for her.’

She stopped speaking, exhausted. She saw things clearly, simply. She leaned forward and took his hands and held them tightly.

‘Listen, Jack. You had no hand in her death. You have got to believe that. Whether it was a genuine accident or an organized one – yes, I mean that, because Naomi sought attention – it was not your doing.’ She took a deep breath. ‘For a while – during the weekend at Castle Dove – I thought you were dead, Jack. It was only for a few hours, actually. But in that time I realized that death really is final; nothing can be done about it. And I wanted you to be alive more than anything else – even if I never saw you again. Just to know you were on this earth would have been enough. And you are here, and I am here, and our son is in love with someone we can love, too. And both our sons are coming home. Jack, we’ve got another chance.’

‘Jude, you know I love you. Do you love me?’

She tried to smile. ‘I don’t know. But – oh, Jack, we’re still together. We’re holding hands. We’ve got to try.’

She felt his grip tighten, and it seemed to give her strength. Her smile widened, and she said, ‘Jennifer and Stanley Markham – Matt called it dancing in the dark. But they were taking the whole thing seriously, making their efforts to have a child into sheer romance.’ She shook his hands gently. ‘Let’s go to Lundy, Jack. Just a couple of weeks. Live from hour to hour while we explore. No heavy stuff about what has happened; simply
be
, side by side, soaking up a new environment. You can still work on your new project, and I can paint again. But mostly I can indulge my nesting instincts to the full!’ She tried to laugh. He leaned towards her and pressed his forehead to hers.

‘Will it be like that couple at Castle Dove?’

‘Jack, I don’t know. It won’t be set up – a game of pretend. And we’ve never done much dancing. But you’ve got a thing about the place, and it seems to me we should try.’

He straightened and looked at her. ‘I would love to go there with you, darling. I might have been a bit delirious, but I felt even then that it was our place.’

As she stood up she felt an urge to lean down and kiss the top of his head, but then she did not. She went into their bedroom and opened windows, made the bed and fetched her pillows from her mother’s old room. She said quietly, ‘The trouble is, Mum, I know him so well – he is so darned familiar. I have to remind myself that he is a stranger.’

And in her head she could hear her mother’s chuckle as she came back immediately, ‘That’s what makes it exciting!’

Judith went to the open window and leaned out, looking at the fading glory of the autumn garden. Her mother had lost speech after her second stroke, and to hear it so clearly now was unusual. Judith whispered, ‘Eunice Denman, you’re still saying the unexpected.’ She waited and nothing happened. She smiled down at the fig tree. ‘OK. So I’ve made a lot of mistakes, and I’ve got to get on with it – that’s what you’d say. And like a dutiful daughter—’ A sudden breeze whipped through her curls, a gentle reprimand. ‘Sorry. A dutiful wife?’ No more breeze, and she put the window on the latch and turned as Jack came into the room. He spotted her pillows immediately and sat down on the end of the bed.

‘Thank you, Jude.’ He was out of breath after showering. ‘Will you phone Robert?’

‘You do it, Jack. I think this is part of his thanks to you for holding him together in Perth.’

‘It was mutual, actually.’ He nodded. ‘I’ve got his mobile number and he’s always got his phone with him.’

Judith thought wryly of the Lorna Doone trip just over a
week ago. Had he had his phone then, in spite of professing not to? And was this Lundy thing another of his plans?

She went downstairs and found Matt in his wetsuit.

‘Thought I’d give it a go – the tide should be up by now.’ He pulled up the zip and went to the door. ‘I’ve been talking to Len. He’s raring to go. I said he could come any time.’

‘Here? Len and Toby? Well, of course. And Dad is going to ring Robert Hausmann and fix something up about going to Lundy. You can all manage here for a couple of weeks, can’t you?’

Matt nodded and screwed his face up. ‘It really is basic on Lundy. Just one room. You wash in the sink. The loo is the size of a small wardrobe.’

‘I can see you must have hated it. Dad being so ill and that terrible storm. How will it be now that Dad is getting better?’

‘Mum, I don’t know. Will Robert the Grim be around?’

‘No,’ she said very definitely.

He relaxed. ‘If it’s unbearable you can always ring, and I’ll take you off in one of the copters.’ She laughed, but he said, ‘I’m serious, Mum. In fact I can fly you there – there’s a landing pad next to the hotel.’

‘Actually, that would be great, Matt. Much easier for Dad.’

It tipped the scales for him; he grinned. ‘I can tell you’re thinking of it as a haven, aren’t you?’

‘I’m not sure. But on a practical level it might be better to get Dad away from the house here until Len and Toby are settled in.’

‘That sounds a valid reason to me; if it is a haven you are hoping for, you will be disappointed.’

He ruffled her hair again, and she ruffled his. They smiled at each other, and she shook her head at him. He said in his little-boy role, ‘Sorry, Mum.’

She slapped his wetsuit, opened the back door and watched him go down the drive to the footpath. He was twenty-eight and already set in his ways.

She said aloud, ‘Thank you, God, for Martha Gifford!’

Then, on an impulse, she went back upstairs to tell Jack that Matt must have always needed Martha Gifford.

The first morning Judith woke up on Lundy, she knew they had done the right thing. She lay very still, orientating herself, conscious of the warmth of the enormous duvet provided by Kitty Davies, and the closeness of Jack, whose head was softly lodged on the back of her neck so that she felt every breath he exhaled.

The oak shutters were supposed to be ‘draught-free’, but somewhere light was creeping into the cottage. She sneaked her arm over the duvet and squinted at her watch. Almost eight thirty. She had slept – and hopefully so had Jack – for nine hours. Mrs Davies had warned them that the birds would wake them up at the crack of dawn, but though the light was still grey, it was well past dawn and there were no birds about yet.