The Butterfly Box (54 page)

he implored, casting his eyes over at Sam who stood by protectively.

‘Don’t call me “little one”. I hate it,’ she snapped, suddenly empowered by Torquil’s vulnerability. ‘I’m not coming home.’

Torquil tried to ignore the defiant tone in her voice. ‘It’s not what you think, damn it!’ he snarled, repressing his frustration with gritted teeth. ‘So I made a mistake keeping that photograph, are you going to punish me for a little mistake? What’s important is that I love you. Love is about forgiveness, goddammit.’

‘Love is about trust,’ she replied coldly.

‘Then trust me when I tell you I’m not having an affair. Lucia’s an old friend, that photograph was a joke.’

‘I don’t believe you.’

‘Do you believe me when I tell you I love you,’ he pleaded with her.

‘You don’t love me, Torquil. You want to possess me, like your car, or your house. I’m like a doll, you dress me, you take me out every now and then to play with me, but you don’t love me. If you did you’d let me make my own decisions.’ Federica began to feel light in the head with the swelling of her confidence.

Torquil was stunned. She had never spoken like that before. He breathed in through his nose like a seething bull, unable to control his growing anger. ‘What are you going to?’ he said quietly, narrowing his eyes aggressively. ‘A provincial town on the coast? Back to your neurotic mother or your bourgeois grandparents?’ Then he nodded in Sam’s direction and added cuttingly, ‘Or to a family of eccentrics?’ Sam suppressed his smile. ‘I can give you everything you want.’

Federica straightened herself up boldly. ‘What? A few more handbags, a few more pairs of shoes? Please, Torquil, don’t patronize me. You’re hollow inside and I don’t want to be with you any more. We’ll communicate through lawyers and don’t try to follow me, because, you know what? Sam’s family eccentricities are contagious and you wouldn’t want to catch them like I have, would you?’

‘You’ll regret this for the rest of your life. I won’t take you back. You’ll be sorry,’ he shouted as she walked to where Sam waited for her by the open door of the cab. He smiled at her with pride as she climbed in, then he followed her and closed the door behind him. When he looked up at the window to Molly and Hester’s flat their happy faces grinned at him from behind the glass.

Hester put her thumb up and nodded.

 

Torquil drove away, the wheels of his Porsche skidding and leaving two black stripes on the tarmac that steamed in fury.

Federica collapsed into the seat, suddenly aware of her trembling hands and legs.

‘Any more of those, Gov?’ asked the cabbie, who had watched the confrontation with relish. ‘That's better than
EastEnders,
that is.’

To Paddington Station, please,’ said Sam, putting his arm around Federica’s shoulders.

She allowed him to gather her up as she quietly reflected on the last four years of her life with relief and regret.

Federica returned to much celebrating, because not only was it Christmas, but everyone was delighted to have her back again. Ingrid now admitted that she had thought Torquil a ‘ghastly man’ while Toby and Julian confessed that they had only remembered where they had seen him when it was too late to do anything about it. ‘He was arrogant and self-satisfied then,’ they said. ‘We really let you down, Fede.’

Helena was delighted that someone else was as miserable as she was and accompanied her daughter on long walks along the cliffs, lamenting Arthur’s painful silence. ‘I’ve lost him, Fede. He won’t even talk to me,’ she whined.

Jake and Polly gathered her up like they had gathered up her mother. Suddenly the family united in the drama. Polly cooked large vegetable lasagnes and bread and butter puddings and all seven of them sat about the table, surrounded by Jake’s model boats which now hung suspended from the ceiling so they couldn’t be knocked onto the floor by clumsy elbows and hands, drinking large glasses of wine and Polly’s elderflower juice, carrying on four conversations at once.

Federica moved straight back in with Toby and Julian and Rasta, who she’d take out on her long walks with her mother. She helped Toby decorate the rooms for Christmas and Julian took her into town to shop for presents. ‘I don’t have a bean,’ she said, thinking of the mountains of beans she had left in London.

‘I do,’ said Julian happily, ‘and you can have as many as you like.’

She spent as much time at Pickthistle Manor as she did at Toby and Julian’s. The squirrel in Sam’s sweater drawer had woken up before time, so Ingrid had

managed to secure his nest on the top of the Christmas tree, but a family of mice had somehow found their way under Sam’s bed so he had to sleep in one of the spare rooms so as not to disturb them. The two families celebrated Christmas with drinks parties and lunch parties that continued long after the festival was over and the New Year had been toasted in with champagne and embraces.

When Sam hugged Federica he kissed her cheek affectionately and said, This will be your year, Fede. You’ll see.’

She hoped he was right.

 

Torquil sent her long letters in an attempt to win her back. He wrote about his deep love for her and his regret that he had ever laid eyes on Lucia. ‘Everything I did was for you, because I wanted to protect you. I’m only guilty of caring too much,’ he wrote. At first Federica read them, then as they got increasingly repetitive and pitiful she simply destroyed them unopened. However, one line lingered in her thoughts: ‘I’m only guilty of caring too much.’ Said by the deceiving Torquil it was nothing more than an empty sentence; however, applied to Arthur it was given a whole new meaning.

Federica felt desperately sorry for Arthur, so forgotten amid the destruction of her own marriage. She knew her mother was hard to live with, but she also knew that she desperately cared. After all, she had listened to Helena’s soliloquies of remorse during their long walks on the cliffs. It was time to intervene.

When Arthur saw Federica at his door he initially felt sick with disappointment. He had thought it was Helena. But then his surprise turned to amazement. ‘What are you doing here?’ he asked.

‘I’ve come to apologize, Arthur,’ she replied. He remained in the frame of the door with his mouth agape. ‘Can I come in?’ she asked.

‘Of course. Of course,’ he stammered, standing aside to let her pass. She walked into the kitchen and took her coat off ‘Please sit down, here, let me take this for you,’ he said, draping it over the back of one of the chairs. ‘Tea?’

‘Yes, please, it’s freezing,’ she said, rubbing her pink hands together.

‘How did you get here?’

‘By taxi.’

‘Does your mother know you’re here?’ he asked anxiously.

‘No.’

‘Good.’

He handed her a cup of tea then sat down opposite her. Federica added milk and watched as it disappeared into the brew.

‘I’ve left Torquil,’ she stated simply.

‘Right,’ Arthur replied with care.

‘I should have listened to you.’

‘No you shouldn’t,’ he said quickly, disarmed by her sudden change in attitude. ‘It was none of my business.’

‘Yes, it was,’ she insisted. ‘You’re my stepfather.’

‘Was,’ he interjected sadly.

She looked into his anguished eyes and realized that she had never really known him. ‘You still are,’ she said kindly. ‘Mama misses you.’

His face flushed with hope. ‘She does?’

‘She thinks she’s lost you.’ Federica watched his small eyes glisten.

‘I don’t know,’ he said, shaking his head and pressing his lips together. ‘I just don’t know.’

‘I’m not coming here to negotiate a peace treaty. I came to apologize because I’ve treated you badly. You’ve been wonderful to Mama. I know she can

be a nightmare,’ she chuckled. ‘But you handled her really well.’ She looked at him steadily. ‘You have to take her back, because no one else would know how to cope with her.’

‘She is difficult, but never dull.’

‘What attracted you to her in the beginning?’ she asked out of curiosity, but unwittingly she unlocked the door to the happy memories that he had wilfully subdued.

He sat back in his chair and smiled. ‘I could tell she was difficult. She had

had a rough time too, so beneath the frost was a little girl desperate to be loved

>

Federica sipped her tea and listened while Arthur related the story of their meeting and their marriage, the good and the bad, until he realized that what he had was worth fighting to keep.

It was late when Arthur drove Federica home. He dropped her off at her uncle’s house then hesitated at the wheel, debating whether to drive on to Helena’s or to return to his own empty home. He still felt the warmth from his conversation with Federica and smiled inwardly at so many tender recollections. Yet he knew that if a reconciliation was to take place, it had to be on

Helena’s initiative or the balance of power would weigh in her favour and he’d lose her again. What’s more, she had to learn from her mistake and be willing to change. He hoped she hadn’t given up on him.

Sam accompanied Federica down to the beach where he’d gather wood for the fires he made and insist on toasting marshmallows just like they had done in the old days. He lent her books to read then discussed them late into the evening beside the happy fire in Nuno’s study before driving her home in his father’s car. He’d sit in his shirtsleeves on the cliffs as much as in the study because he constantly felt warm inside whether or not there was a fire. As long as he was close to Federica he needed little to exist, just the shared air between them and the knowledge that she was there. Little by little he became as comfortable and as familiar to Federica as Nuno’s old chair. She looked forward to their walks and their excursions, to the dinners they had with his parents and the discussions about literature and history. As the weeks tumbled by Federica thought less and less about Torquil and only suffered the occasional nightmare which reminded her in her waking moments of why she had left him.

But she couldn’t forget the notes from her father and she knew she wouldn’t rest until she found him.

It was a strange telephone call that made up her mind to fly out to Chile. She was just about to leave the house when it rang. She was always reluctant to pick it up in case it was Torquil, but she reassured herself that it couldn’t be him, she hadn’t heard from him for weeks. Still, her hand trembled when she lifted the receiver. ‘Hello,’ she said tentatively.

‘Hello,’ replied a young woman. Federica’s shoulders relaxed. ‘Am I speaking to Federica Jensen?’

‘Federica Campione, yes, I am she,’ she answered firmly. ‘Whom am I speaking to?’

‘My name is Claire Shawton. I’m a friend of Hal’s.’

‘Oh, hello,’ she said in a friendlier tone. ‘How can I help you?’

‘Well, it’s a bit of a delicate subject really,’ she began. ‘I didn’t want to talk to your mother, because I know how Hal feels about his mother.’

‘Right,’ said Federica, wondering how he did feel about their mother.

‘And I couldn’t talk to your stepfather either. Hal’s funny about him too.’ ‘Okay.’

‘He speaks very highly of you, though,’ she said. ‘I found your number in his book. No one answered the London number.’

‘I see,’ she mumbled, trying not to think about Torquil. ‘What’s up with Hal?’

‘He’s an alcoholic,’ she stated. ‘He needs help. He’s in a right mess.’

‘What?’ said Federica, appalled. ‘What sort of mess?’

‘He misses all his lectures, sleeps all day, drinks all night. He’s barely there at all, you know, he’s out of it.’

‘Are you sure he’s an alcoholic?’

‘Yes, I am. I know because I’ve been paying for his drink and his gambling for the last few months.’

‘Gambling?’

‘You know, fruit machines, poker, horses. I’ve paid for it all.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I’m in love with him,’ she replied in shame. ‘He doesn’t have any money and I have lots. But it’s got out of hand. He’s drinking too much. He’s changed.’

‘Where is he now?’

‘He’s here asleep.’

‘At this hour?’

‘Yes, you see he stays up drinking all night, then he can’t get to sleep so he takes sleeping pills, lots of them. Then he can’t wake up. It’s like he’s dead.’ She stammered and her voice quivered with emotion. ‘I don’t know what to do,’ she sniffed.

‘Oh God!’ Federica sighed. ‘What can we do?’

‘He needs help.’

‘I can see that. I’m coming up. But I’ll have to bring someone with me,’ she said, remembering that she couldn’t drive.

Sam was only too happy to drive Federica to Exeter. They talked all the way about the options open to them. But Sam was adamant that the drink was only the symptom of an illness which lay far deeper. ‘He drinks to hide from himself,’ he said wisely.

‘It all leads back to Papa,’ Federica sighed. ‘I just know it.’

When they found Hal lying asleep on his bed, his face sallow and lifeless, Federica began to shake him violently, fearing that he was dead and not asleep at

all. When he woke up his eyes were bloodshot and distant. Not the Hal she knew at all. Sam looked around the room at the squalor he lived in.

Cigarettes were stubbed out on dirty plates which still bore the remains of greasy fry-ups, empty wine glasses and coffee cups lay collecting dust, clothes were strewn around the floor, mildewing from neglect and damp. The room smelt worse than the rabbit hutch that Hester had once had as a child.