The Darkest Secret (18 page)

I put the car back into gear and we trickle on round another corner. And there's Sean Jackson's final achievement: Blackheath House. A country house turned, with his ineffable eye, into a country house hotel. A Queen Anne house that looks spray-blasted and painted and pointed, the roof tiles in perfect rows and the balustrade along the first-floor platform where the front door lets out replaced at an expense that normally belongs in the Hollywood hills. It's as old as the trees around it, this house, but Sean has stripped it of its antiquity and made it horribly, painfully perfect. Even if I'd not known whose house it was, I would have recognised his hand the moment I saw it. Everything gleams, the way it does at Disneyland.

A collection of cars sits on the gravel sweep below the front door. Two Mercedes, a Bentley and a Range Rover, and a V-reg Ford Fiesta with the front wing bashed in, scattered like Tonka toys discarded by a careless child. The Clutterbucks are by their big shiny car, which I notice has rental plates – keeping up appearances as they come back to the country – unloading a huge, ugly bouquet of flowers from the back seat.

I pull in at the edge of a swath of lawn that has either been kept with love for four hundred years or was laid last autumn. I'd hazard the second. We step out. The house is silent. No one has come out to see us arrive, to enfold us in the family bosom.

I march over to Charlie. ‘What the hell was that about?'

He feigns a jump of surprise, as though he hasn't noticed me approach. It must be a politician thing; I'm sure I've seen Boris and Dave and even John Prescott pull the same pantomime. You're insignificant, it says, you matter so little I'm surprised you're even addressing me; but it does so in a way that you can't pin on them, because the surprise, you never know, might be genuine.

‘Excuse me?'

Imogen stands back by the suitcases, her eyes running up and down my body, working out if I'm worth acknowledging. She was always like that. Only ever spoke to me when I was in my father's company. After all, back in those days I didn't even have a vote to offer. Can't think why I didn't realise it before, but she's a big old Dependent, is Imogen. Can't do a thing without the Great God Charlie's approval. That's why they've stayed married so long, of course. Only a big old Dependent would see life with Charlie Clutterbuck as preferable to life in a gutter.

‘Oh, come on, Charlie. Don't pretend you did it by accident. Why the hell did you block me like that? What was that all about?'

He considers me. ‘And you are… ?'

And suddenly I realise that he doesn't know who I am. These adults who loomed so large in our own lives – you forget how little you figured in theirs. In our self-awareness, our stew of emotions, it never occurred to us that to Charlie and Imogen, and the rest of them, I suppose, we were little more than blobs. Accessories of the adults in our lives. Not people at all. Ruby has got out of the car and is shuffling awkwardly on the gravel. He probably has no idea who she is either. We're just little people in a little car, probably the help.

‘Milly,' I say. ‘I'm Milly Jackson. And that's Ruby. The daughters? Remember us?'

Charlie jumps into action. ‘Why, Milly, my dear! You've changed. And Ruby! How
are
you? My dears, I just want to say how sorry I am.'

‘For your loss,' says Imogen.

‘… for your loss. Your father was a great man. One of my lifelong friends, as you know.'

Oh, shut up, you pompous prick. ‘We'd be better if you'd not blocked us out to run the gamut like that. I can't believe you did that. What were you thinking?'

‘I…' He can't think of anything that doesn't reflect badly on him. I'm surprised at my own boldness. We weren't brought up to talk to the adults as equals. Even a couple of years ago I would have been calling him Mr Clutterbuck. He's developed a very high colour over the years. His face looks purple and I can see broken veins all up the side of his nose, even in the gloom.

A voice calls from the porch. ‘Hello! What are you doing down there in the cold? You must all be dying for a drink.'

We all turn and see Maria Gavila in the open front door, big dramatic hair and a soft red jersey dress. She's wrapped a shawl around her shoulders and hugs herself as she speaks.

Ruby bursts into tears.

An outbreak of shouting outside, then the engine stops and the activity at Seawings falls silent. The women all look up the way you look up when a car backfires in the street.

‘Ahh,' says Maria. ‘It's like banging your head against a brick wall, isn't it? So lovely when you stop.'

The others laugh. Everybody loves Maria, even when she's spouting banalities. She shines empathy through every pore. Simone still remembers the delight she felt when her father found someone so warm and open-armed to marry when she was five. Maria made her feel special. It was a number of years before she realised that this is how Maria makes everybody feel. Every day. It's not her personality, it's her job.

Maria makes her living by selling stories to the press, or by diverting the press's attention from stories their subjects don't want to get out by selling other, lesser clients down the river. Mostly former clients. People don't realise, when they take on someone like Maria to raise their profile, that once she's raised that profile, made you someone the papers want to know about, you'll need to keep paying forever. The warm, empathetic air is there to gull you into spilling the beans, to soften you up for the inevitable ‘if I'm going to represent you, I need to know everything. I can't keep those skeletons in the closet if I don't know they're there.' And woe betide you if you should ever fall out. To a business like Maria's, a new client is just an ex-client you haven't betrayed yet. Nowadays, when an ancient scandal about a long-retired boy-band member breaks in the Sunday papers, Simone's first thought is to wonder which of Maria's current clients has been caught taking part in a spit-roast.

But she admires her, at the same time. You have to feel respect for someone who can keep in touch with the first wife and stay cordial with the second. Maria and Linda are laughing as they cut up melon and grapes for the kids' breakfasts, joking about something to do with swimsuits. Linda is wearing a bikini, though it's not yet nine and no one's been near the pool. She wears a little shortie white kaftan on top, with a gilt chain belt draped on the tops of her hips, but it's see-through enough that it might as well not be there. On her feet are white slingbacks. Claire, strapping the twins into their high chairs, looks sourly at her. You can see why. To Simone she looks like the height of sophistication, as if she's stepped out on to the deck of a yacht at Cap Ferrat. Even though she has an old woman's body, she's at least made an effort to maintain it, even after three children.

Claire has never really got her figure back after the twins, and they're three years old now. Her stomach is still loose under her dress; she'll never wear a bikini again. The sight makes Simone melancholy. I would never let myself go like that, she thinks. I would exercise and exercise until my stomach was as hard as Linda's. Poor Sean, condemned to that for the rest of his life. No wonder he's vulnerable. Some women have no idea how lucky they are.

Maria catches her eye, and winks. Sucks her into her circle of warmth again. I'm on
your
side, the wink says. Simone smiles sweetly back at her. She has learnt at the feet of the best.

The children are still dopey. Only Joaquin was awake when the women came into the annexe to let them out, and even he was relatively easy, just sitting on his bed, staring at flies, rather than bouncing off the ceiling as he normally would have been. Inigo yawns and stretches over his cereal bowl. Though she had no pill herself last night, Simone knows exactly how he feels. She feels loose-limbed and languid this morning, as though she's been dipped in honey, entranced by her own burgeoning power. He would have been mine, she thinks, if he weren't such an honourable man. I could feel it between us, electric attraction, as he fed me that cake. I never knew something so simple could be so mesmerising.

‘And that's another thing,' says Linda, proudly. ‘No tantrums in the morning, either. Honestly, I'd give it to them every day if it weren't illegal.'

‘When we get into power,' says Imogen, the ‘we' presumably being her husband's party, ‘we're going to dial back all these controls. Health and Safety is completely out of control. We're in danger of bringing up a complete generation of wimps.'

‘And then who would we send to war?' asks Claire. ‘Just imagine.'

Imogen doesn't hear the edge to her voice, though everyone else does. Simone has noticed this about the political wives who have drifted through their house while her parents covered up some peccadillo, some minor expenses irregularity: that the only humour they're prepared to acknowledge is the good-sport charity water-balloon kind. Imogen wouldn't spot irony if it got up and slapped her in the face.

‘Well, you know,' she says, ‘it
will
affect the economy. A certain attrition rate among young men does act as a check on population growth. And, of course, no pensions.' She beams. ‘So nice to be somewhere where one can say these things,' she says. ‘One has to mind one's Ps and Qs so much when one's dealing with the electorate. The Blairs have them so wound up about prejudice that they'll get offended at the drop of a hat.'

Claire bites her lip and pours orange juice into the collection of sippy cups. Puts two in front of her daughters and strokes their warm, silky heads. Coco leans back against her and she puts an arm round her shoulders, presses her closer in. Simone watches, feels a twist of envy. It's not fair. Why was I born so late?

‘But surely,' says Linda, ‘the cost of all the injured ones must cancel that out?'

‘Not really,' says Imogen. ‘They're not going to be starting so many bar fights if they're on crutches, are they?'

A little silence follows this statement, then there's a small explosion of laughter. ‘Oh, Imogen,' says Linda, ‘you're hilarious.'

‘What?' asks Imogen. ‘I'm only telling the truth. You just have to look at the statistics to see it makes sense.'

You really are the stupidest woman I've ever met, thinks Simone, and I've met the Spice Girls. No wonder your awful husband married you. You're exactly the way he thinks women are.

A sound in the garden, and the men, one by one, troop in through the patio door. Apart from Jimmy, they're dressed as one in Home Counties seaside casual: baggy shorts in Madras check, button-down cotton shirts, and, because the sun's only just started burning the dew off the grass, V-necked jumpers for warmth. Jimmy wears jeans and a faded Nirvana tour T-shirt from 1992. He looks as though he plays in a tribute act that tours caravan sites. They look pleased with themselves, as though they have won a great victory.

‘Well done,' says Maria. ‘What did you say?'

‘Well,' says Sean, ‘in the end I let money speak for me. What's the point of being a millionaire if you can't buy what you want, eh?'

‘How much?'

‘A grand,' he says, casually, as though he's talking chump change. ‘Half now and the rest if they hold off till noon tomorrow.'

‘They tried to claim they had a contractual deadline of tonight and they'd start paying penalties after that,' says her father, ‘but I asked them if they really thought anyone would be over to check before the bank holiday was done, and they didn't have an answer to that.'

‘I said I'd pay the penalty as well,' says Sean. ‘I wanted to keep them off till Monday, but they're catching a boat back to Poland tomorrow night, so…'

‘Oh, well
done
,' says Maria. ‘You're my heroes.'

‘Of course,' says Charlie, ‘I asked them if their paperwork was in order. They came right back with the Freedom of Movement Act. Bloody EU. This country's going to be swarming with Eastern Europeans by the end of the decade, mark my words.'

‘And then we'll have our brickies up in arms about their taking our jobs,' says Imogen. ‘Should've thought about that before they got themselves unionised up to the hilt.' The average British builder, in her eyes, is a Labour voter. She'd be far more worried if the Czechs were heading for the Square Mile.

‘Any coffee on the go?' asks Jimmy. ‘I feel like something died in my mouth.'

‘Maybe you could try brushing your teeth occasionally,' says Linda, and doesn't look at him. He laughs and gives her the finger. Simone is sensitive enough to atmosphere to feel the tiny frisson that runs round the room. She's beginning to understand that banter is one of those things that unhappy couples use to cover up their loathing when they're in public. Linda and Jimmy, Sean and Claire: barbs flying between them wrapped in bare-toothed grins, and nobody, she sees now, is fooled by it. Her father and Maria never, ever talk to each other like that. But then, she's never seen them disagree, either. They're like a well-oiled machine, each thought, each emotion moving in such harmony that they can finish each other's sentences, the common goal so implicitly understood that it never needs to be discussed. Move ourselves forward. Move our children forward. Get what we want. Never make enemies.

‘Eat up,' says Linda in a general address, ‘and we can go to the beach.'

‘I'm not going anywhere,' says Jimmy. ‘If we've paid a grand to get peace and quiet at the pool, I'm damn well staying at the pool.'

‘We?' asks Linda, eyes innocently widened. ‘Where did
we
get a grand from?'

Jimmy's eyes narrow and he walks over to the espresso machine. Starts slamming it about, lifting lids and peering in, jiggling the coffee scoop. ‘Here,' says Simone, crossing the kitchen to join him. ‘Let me.'

‘Ah, lovely.' A hand lands on the back of her neck, makes her shudder. ‘At least there's
someone
in this house who'll give an old man a hand.'

She wriggles out from under the touch. Jimmy smells sour. Chemicals leaking out through his skin, she supposes, and the fact that he's not been near the shower since he got here. He's probably relying on the swimming pool for his baths. She makes a mental note not to go in there again.

Linda picks up her coffee cup. ‘Well, I'm going to try out that jacuzzi,' she says. ‘Are you ladies okay finishing up the breakfast? I'll load the dishwasher when I get out.'

‘Ah,' says Sean, and starts to fall in step behind her swaying hips, ‘jacuzzi sounds just the ticket.'

‘You enjoy yourself,' says Maria. ‘We'll finish up here and take the littlies down to the beach.'

‘No,' says Claire, abruptly, ‘sorry, Sean, but I need to go and get this nail sorted out. The one you broke yesterday, with the mattress? You'll have to look after the twins till I get back.'

Simone goes over to the island to look for a spoon to measure the coffee with. In the drawer are last night's pills, left there by Linda. Stupid place to put them, she thinks. At least three of those kids are tall enough to get in there. She tucks them underneath the cutlery holder, where they'll be out of sight but still accessible for later, selects a spoon and goes back to the coffee machine.

‘Oh,' says Sean.

‘Perhaps they'd like to go in the jacuzzi with you and Linda?' Claire says, ever so sweetly, and holds his eye until he harrumphs and looks away. ‘Wouldn't that be fun? They'd love that. Wouldn't you love that, girls? Lovely hot bath with bubbles? And time with your Daddy?'

The twins don't look impressed by the suggestion, but they're barely awake.

‘Can't you do it later?' he asks. ‘Or take them with you?'

‘Sorry,' she says. ‘I'm going to have to just park up in town and walk around till I find somewhere.'

‘Why don't you Google it on your phone?' asks Simone.

‘You can do that?' says Imogen. ‘Whatever next?'

‘Yes, look.' She picks up Claire's phone and finds the internet browser. ‘See? And here's Google. You can Google manicurists in Bournemouth.'

‘Well, I never,' says Claire, though she looks sick. ‘I'd heard you could do this on the new phones but I never imagined mine was one of those.'

‘Oh, for God's sake,' says Sean, impatiently, ‘do you never look at these things? Of course I got you an internet phone. The whole office has one.'

‘I did think it was quite chunky. My last one was so little and neat. And all those little letters. It did seem pretty silly, just for sending texts. But how do I pay? Am I going to get some horrendous bill?'

‘It's on your plan. Jesus. Women! Don't you read
anything
?'

‘It's a
phone
, Sean,' she says in that little hurt voice of hers. ‘I know how to work a
phone
.'

‘I don't believe in the internet,' says Imogen.

‘It's the wave of the future, Imogen,' says Maria. ‘All the papers are putting themselves online. Charlie's got a website. Didn't you know?'

Imogen looks startled, as though someone's just told her her husband has a part-time job as a stripper. ‘Well, I'll have to see about that,' she says.

‘Oy oy,' says Charlie, ‘old lady on the warpath. Up to my arse in alligators before long.'

‘Anyway,' says Claire, ‘it's beside the point. I'll have to go into town and find the place and find a parking space and get to wherever we're going from it with a pushchair and they really get fed up if you've got two three-year-olds in tow in those shops. They're never exactly over-blessed with space. It's no good, Sean. You're the one who
minds
if my nails are a mess. Do you want me showing you up at dinner?'

‘No,' says Sean, sulkily.

‘I know!' says Simone. She's been eyeing the jacuzzi hopefully since they arrived. She rather fancies the idea of a long morning wallowing among the jets. ‘Why don't we take
all
the kids to the Jacuzzi? It'll be fun!'