Relative Love (24 page)

As she pulled into the drive she saw the light go out in their bedroom. She hurried upstairs, checked Roland briefly, then cleaned her teeth and slipped into bed. Colin asked her about the evening, but sleepily. When she got to the miscarriage story, he said, ‘Well, well,’ and turned on his side. Elizabeth turned with him, pressing her nose between his shoulder blades and nestling her legs against his. She rarely initiated their lovemaking, but that night she found herself wanting to. Not because she felt libidinous, but because she longed suddenly for the physical comfort – the graphic solidity – of sexual intimacy. She reached down and ran one finger gently from the back of his knee to the curve of his bottom, feeling the first stirrings of genuine desire. ‘Colin?’ She began to move the finger back down his leg only to feel his hand close round hers and remove it. He patted her arm and shifted away from her, murmuring goodnight. Soon he was snoring, so loudly that Elizabeth took refuge in the spare room. A few minutes later Roland, who had only been pretending to sleep, whispered farewell to his teddy and tiptoed along the landing to join her.

Stephen walked slowly, burrowing his chin into the roll of his polo-neck, his eyes on the ground. After the serene padded whiteness of the Sussex countryside that afternoon, the melting clumps of black snow lining the London streets looked particularly ugly. He had been nervous of returning to Ashley House, but also tremendously excited. Striding down the last few yards of the lane approaching the drive, the limbs of the tall trees overhead crusted with snow, he had felt as if he was in the central aisle of some vast natural cathedral. On the verges clumps of long grass were pushing through the snow, brilliant green straggles of hair against the white. The air was hushed and still, but when he stopped, bending down to attend to a shoelace, he realised that the silence was not silence at all but a bubbling whisper of melting snow. Somewhere to his left among a tangle of lush holly and rusty bracken he could hear the gurgle of a stream. Further on, the water became more visible, trickling into a ditch that opened up alongside the road. Ashley
House appeared suddenly, as he rounded a bend in the lane, looking huge and firm against the chequered green and white of its surroundings, its chimney-stacks like the funnels of a ship, its vast soft- grey brick walls crawling handsomely with ivy. He had forgotten how big it was and yet how welcoming, managing in a way he couldn’t define to combine all the grandeur of a stately home with the cosiness of a cottage. A plume of smoke was spiralling out of one of the chimneys, making pencil sketches against the white sky. The roofs of the main house and what he could see of the barns and outhouses were still plump with snow. A ginger cat was crouching on a section of the low stone wall next to the garage, its tail twitching as it watched a bird hopping across the roof.

Stephen paused, fearful suddenly of imposing his presence on something so perfect. Although it was only a couple of months since his initial visit, it felt far longer. He had been nervous then, but in nothing like the way he was now. Then it had only been his book that was at stake. Now it felt as if his entire life hung in the balance. The book mattered only in that it was his cover for being there. He had all sorts of questions planned, but all he really cared about was getting close to Cassie. In recent weeks progress on his manuscript had slowed from sluggish to virtually nonexistent. His editor, understanding over one missed deadline for a glimpse of work-in-progress, was growing openly impatient. In recent phone-calls there had been unpleasant talk of nonnegotiable publication dates and the financial implications of failure to deliver the goods. Stephen, stalling as best he could, had felt more than ever that Cassie Harrison had somehow become his muse, that if he could make progress with her, the manuscript – its impossible sprawl and turgidity – would start to take shape.

There was a cast-iron boot-scraper next to the front door in the shape of a fox. As he waited for the door to be answered, Stephen tried it out with some curiosity, feeling the cold metal through his worn soles. And then, because the door remained unanswered, he began to whistle under his breath, staring so hard at the bush of yellow winter jasmine next to the bell-pull that yellow spots danced before his eyes. When he tugged on the bell a second time and still no one came, he began to think he was going mad. It was the day they had arranged and, approaching the door, he had distinctly heard the strains of piano-playing. Somewhere inside, Boots was in paroxysms of frenzied barking. Oh, God, the dog will have a heart-attack, he thought. The dog will die and it will be my fault.

He had been so relieved at Pamela’s eventual appearance that it was a few seconds before he registered her peculiar dishevelment. Though her fingers fluttered to the loops of her bun, most of her hair had broken free of it and hung to her shoulders. The whites of her usually crystal blue eyes were visibly bloodshot and – worst of all, somehow – there was a blue smear of eyeshadow running from the corner of her left eyelid to her temple.

Stephen, having taken all this in, broke into a sweat of embarrassment. ‘Have I got the wrong day?’

‘My dear Mr Smith – Stephen – no, of course not. Come in, come in. I’ll make coffee – do go through – the kitchen – the drawing room. Make yourself at home – I’ll be right with you.’

It had gone okay after that. Perfectly, in fact. Stephen had waited in the drawing room, which smelt of leather, and woodsmoke from a fire burning merrily in the hearth. Two large china dogs with painted faces sat on either side beneath a row of gleaming brass fire irons. Stephen took the poker and rummaged under the logs for the fun of it, then went to admire the photograph of Cassie on the table behind the sofa. At which point something curious and wonderful occurred, so wonderful that the warmth of it still glowed in Stephen’s heart hours later as he paced the dark streets of London. A cream envelope had been lying behind the photo, addressed in neat loopy
writing to John Harrison. The postcode was Pimlico and the letter, which Stephen, feeling like a spy, had eased out of the envelope, began, ‘Darling Dad, I just wanted to write with a proper thank you for the latest advance on my inheritance! Seriously, you are very kind and I …’ In two seconds the letter was back exactly as he had found it. All he had needed was the address at the top, the number and the street. It took no effort to commit them to memory, but he would have carved them with a knife on his own skin if it had been necessary. A few minutes later Pamela reappeared, her hair pinned back into place, her face smiling and glistening with a fresh dusting of powder. They had adjourned to the kitchen for coffee and home-baked honey and raisin flapjacks. Feverish with happiness at having secured Cassie’s address so effortlessly, Stephen had eaten ravenously, throwing out any old question he could think of relating to Eric and barely listening to any of Pamela’s answers. When she had asked if he would like to visit the nursing-home he had said no, absolutely not, that thanks to her and John he already had a wonderful feel for the man and wanted only to commit it all to paper.

Pamela, watching her young guest wolf her flapjacks and wave his arms with enthusiasm, filling her big empty kitchen with his energy, felt remarkably composed. Composed and rescued. It was just what she had needed. A visit from an outsider, someone interested in but wholly disconnected from the family. Someone young and charming. On the doorstep she kissed him, even though she could see he wasn’t expecting it. ‘It’s been a pleasure, Stephen. And I hope it helped.’

‘Oh, yes,’ Stephen had assured her, grinning like a madman. ‘Enormously.’ He had run nearly all the way back to Barham station, the address of Cassie’s flat singing like a tune in his head.

And now … now he was visiting her. Having reached the corner of Cassie’s street, Stephen stopped to breathe deeply, somewhat in awe of his own behaviour. A black cat with white paws sprinted across the road next to him, from left to right. Which was lucky, he told himself, edging forwards along the pavement, feeling like a climber groping across a cliff face. On reaching the bottom of the steps leading up to the entrance, he stopped again and stared longingly at the front door. Of course there was no question of ringing the bell, not that night anyway. It was already well past midnight and he needed a pretext. It was just a question of being patient, waiting for the opportunity, not losing heart. All his life he had given up on things, he reminded himself: his crap family, his university course, the job in Madrid where he had taken fright at the prospect of promotion, escaping to South America where he could be rootless and safe. And now his book on heroes … But he didn’t want to think about that. Tonight he felt like a hero himself, a knight on a quest, a knight who would stop at nothing until he had attained his holy grail.

Stephen ran his eyes over the building, which was one in a line of tall red-brick Victorian blocks. He concentrated hard on the windows of the first floor where he knew she lived. They were dark, the curtains drawn, their white frames glowing gently in the dark. It was wonderful just to know she was inside, contained and safe.

Turning at last to go, Stephen recognised her black Volkswagen parked on the opposite side of the road and hurried over to it. Wanting to do something – to leave his mark – he traced a small heart in the thin film of frost covering the windscreen. Liking the effect, he drew another and then another, until the tip of his finger ached with cold and the entire windscreen was covered with dancing heart-shaped footsteps.

Exhausted from his sojourn in London, John slept in his armchair for an hour before dinner and then again during the ten o’clock news, using Boots as a footstool. When he woke during the
weather forecast and saw that Pamela, too, was dozing, her head lolling, he had prodded her awake rather roughly, not liking to see her look so old. Upstairs he watched her, as he had many thousands of times, sit before the framed oval mirror of her dressing-table to attend to her face and hair. The dressing-table was one of the numerous handsome pieces of furniture that had belonged to his parents, made of soft golden cedarwood and inlaid round the edges with mother-of-pearl studs. His mother, too, had spent many hours in front of it, and his grandmother. The glass was faintly speckled with age but only near the top and bottom. Somewhere round the back he had taken a chip out of it with one of his front teeth during a game of chase with Eric. The tooth had disappeared into his gums, literally returned to its roots, then slowly grown out again as if nothing had ever been amiss.

‘So, you had a good day, you say?’

Pamela smiled at his reflection in the glass. ‘Yes … yes, I did. And you did too, didn’t you? I’m so glad the boys were well.’

‘Yes, they were fine. Charlie seems to be pulling through —’ John broke off, suddenly remembering the marmalade, which was still in his briefcase. ‘And Freddie Grimling sent his love,’ he added quickly. ‘He’s having a hard time of it. His syndicates took a real bashing with the towers and Mary’s arthritis is bad. They’re thinking of moving down to Cornwall to be near her sister. George Crowell wasn’t too good either, thinking of a hip replacement.’

‘Oh dear, poor things.’ Pamela, working in the last of her hand cream, paused before adding, ‘Did you remember the marmalade?’

‘Oh … yes, of course. Both very grateful.’

The blue eyes were open in an instant, sharp as knives. ‘Oh, John, you forgot it, didn’t you?’

Propped up in bed in his stripy pyjamas, his half-moon reading glasses balanced on the end of his nose, John squirmed among the pillows like a guilty child. ‘I’m sorry, Pammy, I … It just slipped my mind.’

‘Never mind.’ She tied her hair loosely off her face with a velvet ribbon, her expression softening. ‘It will be Easter soon. I’ll give them all some then. It really doesn’t matter.’ She smiled again, wanting to show him that she spoke from the heart, too drained by the recent secret rollercoaster ride of her emotions to mind about such a small thing.

‘Lucky you were in for that biographer fellow … Not like you to forget.’

‘No, not like me.’ Pamela sat on the edge of the bed and carefully swivelled sideways, easing both legs under the sheets. ‘I don’t think he noticed, and if he did he didn’t seem to mind. He says he won’t need to visit Eric, by the way, which is just as well. Oh, yes, and I think he might have a bit of a thing for Cassie. They did get on, didn’t they, when he stayed that time? And I saw him looking at that photo in the drawing room … such a look.’

‘A thing for Cassie … has he now? Well, charming he may be, but I think Cassie could do a lot better.’

‘Oh, John, don’t be so old-fashioned.’

‘And you shouldn’t be so romantic. Money matters, my dear, and unless I’m much mistaken that biographer fellow hasn’t got very much of it.’

‘I would like Cassie to fall in love, that’s all,’ murmured Pamela. ‘I do admire the independence of our youngest. She’s always been so good at knowing what she wanted – unlike Elizabeth – but it would be nice if she could meet the right man, regardless of his income,’ she added, giving her husband a stern look.

John, who had spent a good portion of the day talking in various ways about money and feeling for the most part hugely reassured by it, gave an impatient stab at his glasses. ‘Of course I’d like
Cassie to fall in love – it’s high time. But we don’t want her making the sort of mistake Elizabeth did, do we? That Lucien fellow was a fortune-hunter if ever I saw one.’

‘Was he? I’m not entirely sure you’re right there. Anyway, I don’t think Stephen Smith is a fortune-hunter.’

‘Maybe not.’ John reached for his book, opened it and closed it again. He was aware that this gentle bedtime banter was a good thing, that the icy unhappiness under which they had both, silently, been labouring since their granddaughter’s death had at long last begun to disperse like the snow outside. If the visit from the writer had cheered Pamela then that was fine too. The man could visit a million times if that was the result. And in the end Cassie could marry whomsoever she chose, and whenever she wanted because, thanks to his financial good fortune, she would one day become a woman of considerable wealth. Even after the Inland Revenue had done its worst she, like Elizabeth and Charlie, still stood to inherit a good three hundred thousand pounds. This fact had struck John with fresh, reassuring force during the course of his lunch with his sons. We have been robbed of little Tina, he had thought, but we still have four wonderful children and their equally wonderful families. They were the future. And, thanks to family fortunes and his own hard work, they had a secure future to look forward to. They had a true inheritance, which was a rare thing these days. Such thoughts had warmed his heart as much as the port he had sipped in his club. Hearing his friends discuss financial losses, illness and plans for down-sizing moves to bungalows, John had basked in the resilience of his own happier circumstances. His liabilities as a Lloyds Member were spread over many more syndicates than theirs – reinsurance, marine, non-marine, he had a finger in every pie. Following the towers atrocity he had moved much more heavily into the American markets, capitalising on the premiums that had sky-rocketed as a result. The hit he had taken on the towers themselves had been minimal compared to that of his colleagues. ‘My God, Pammy,’ he burst out, slapping the counterpane so hard she jumped in surprise, ‘we are so
lucky
, that’s what I realised today. That vicar chap at Tina’s funeral was absolutely right. Our family, contrary to most bloody families these days – fragmenting shambolic things – is strong. It’s like a – a huge, indestructible … ocean liner, which will sail on long after you and I are gone.’