Not Another Happy Ending (34 page)

She watches Roddy swing by, Nicola at his side, his class trooping behind them like ducklings. Ducklings with smartphones.

He motions towards the buffet table. ‘“The funeral
baked meats did coldly furnish forth the marriage table”? Anyone? Anyone? Come on 6b, it's a classic.’

‘Is it
Avatar
, sir?’

‘Yes, Gordon, it's
Avatar
.’

He exchanges a weary look with Nicola. Whispers something to her.

‘No,’ she says coyly. ‘I can't.’

‘Oh go on,’ he urges. ‘It's fun.’

He squeezes her hand and she relents with an indulgent sigh. Roddy swiftly gathers the class around him, directs them to the signing table. Jane feels thirty pairs of eyes study her minutely.

He claps his hands sharply. ‘Pay attention, class.’

Nicola clears her throat and addresses the children. ‘Jane Lockhart, of course, follows Charlotte Brontë as only the second writer in English to design and build her own hovercraft.’

‘Ho-ver-craft,’ repeats Roddy. ‘Write that down.’

A few of them assiduously copy the misinformation into their notebooks, but Jane is pleased to see that most ignore him in preference to filching a vol-au-vent from the table. Roddy nods approvingly at Nicola.

When Jane looks up, her dad is at the head of the queue.

‘We've got to stop meeting like this,’ she says lightly, then leans in to add confidentially, ‘You don't need to buy a book, y'know. I get a load of freebies.’

And then she sees that he's clutching a copy of her
Happy Ending
, or as it will always be known between them,
The Endless Anguish of My Father
. He kneads the book between callused fingers, his face twisted in concern, the vein in his temple bulging. ‘You read it then,’ she says, preparing herself for the inevitable outburst.

He nods slowly. ‘Her dad. He was a real shit to her, a right nasty piece of work.’

‘He's not y—’

He cuts across her objection. ‘But in the end, she forgives him.’

And she sees that he gets it. Finally.

‘Monsieur L!’

Tom sweeps in, buoyed up by whatever news Anna LeFèvre has just imparted, and points at the copy of
Happy Ending
in Benny's hands, grinning as he says, ‘If you think that was bad, wait till you see what she's done with you in the new one.’

Jane sees her dad blench, starts to explain that Tom is joking. Aren't you, Tom? But Benny's OK with it—whatever she's written. After all, it's just a story.

‘Mr Lockhart, Benny—excuse us, would you?’

Tom steers her past the queuing readers, apologising that there will be a slight delay in proceedings, but that Jane will be back signing momentarily. Feel free to have another canapé.

‘I thought the Pandemic Media people were coming today,’ she says as he hustles her across the cemetery.

‘Uh-huh. They're here.’

She scans the gathering, looking for someone who might be a malevolent financier, though she's not sure what's
de rigueur
for the soulless investor these days.

‘It's Anna.’

‘Your bank manager?’

‘Not any longer. Pandemic hired her to look after Tristesse. Apparently, they want someone in the company who won't let me get away with my usual extravagance. I feel that's a harsh characterisation.’

‘This from the man who insisted on six different vols-au-vent and a string quartet.’

They stand facing one another at the edge of the cemetery on the hill, the roofs and spires of the East End spread out below them. The sandstone city glows in the afternoon sunshine, but for the first time that day she notices a stray cloud wander across the sky.

She studies Tom. The Scottish weather had almost done for him, but the sallowness in his skin has long gone, revitalised by the recent spell of sunshine. Riviera-blue eyes, well, they sparkle. What else could they do? As much as he tries to turn his back on it, he is a child of the sun. In a moment of abandon he'd promised to take her to meet his parents. Not to
meet
them, not like that. Apparently they run a
bijou
literary festival from their house in the south of France. Roddy had Googled it. More of a château, he informed her. Y'know, towers, parkland, visible from space. Seems the Duvals are descended from nobility,
which means she's dating a prince. So much for her indie cred. The writer of gritty urban miserablism has turned into fucking Cinderella.

‘What are you thinking?’

‘Something dark and depressing. I'm definitely not having pink and sparkly thoughts.
Right
?’ she insists.

‘OK, OK.’ He holds up his hands in surrender. ‘You're inconsolably wretched and gloomy. Happy?’

More clouds straggle after the first. The wind picks up, blowing her hair and she smooths it back into place.

‘So, you've fulfilled your contract,’ he announces, sounding all business. ‘We're done.’

‘Yes. I suppose we are.’ Not sure where this is going. She contemplates this set of affairs, sees him struggle with some great inner difficulty.

‘Unless …’ he begins.

‘Yes?’

‘It's been a long, hard journey, and you are, frankly, about the most infuriating person I've ever met, which considering I work in Scottish publishing is saying something.’

‘Thank you.’

‘But we couldn't have got here without each other. So … Jane, what I'm saying is … will you …’

The first drops of rain start to fall. The guests at the book launch scamper for cover. The ‘Funeral March’ ceases as the string quartet put up their instruments and follow suit. The undertakers quickly shut the casket lid.

Tom dips a hand into his jacket and pulls out a rolled up document.

She eyes it suspiciously. ‘Is that … a contract?’

‘Two more books and an option for a third.’

‘Exclusive?’

‘Naturally, we'd have to work very closely.’

‘With lots of notes?’

‘An
excessive
amount of notes.’

‘OK. I do
,’
she says quickly. Too quickly. ‘I mean—
I will
. Oh just give it here …’

And she is uncapping her pen and he is unfolding the contract at the signature page, and suddenly, almost by accident, they are kissing in the rain.