The Love Letter (37 page)

Casting the script aside, she switched off the reading light and padded to the window to watch the dawn steal over the village roofs. The last of the bats were flying in, soft brown missiles hurtling past on their black umbrella wings. The silver light seemed to transform the higgledy-piggledy roof tiles into pewter and pearl scales. Curling away from her up the steep hill along its two cobbled lanes, the village looked so trapped-in-time, picture-postcard medieval that she half expected to catch sight of a flapping black cloak as Francis or Édith swept back up to the hall after a night blood-sucking.

Sleep had brought her no heart-ease.

Francis had hardened and cooled, his broken heart reconditioned all wrong just as Lucy had said. Legs felt the responsibility for that new cruelty resting on her shoulders. Glimpses of the old Francis still showed through, tempting her to surrender herself back to the safe haven of nostalgia and mutual comfort, but something kept stopping her from responding to his calls to ‘say the word’.

It occurred to her that in their heyday he would never have seen her off with a peck on the cheek as he had last night, however angry he was with Poppy. The Francis she remembered would have pursued her to the Book Inn and been outside her window by midnight, ready to scale the ivy and make love feverishly before talking until dawn. Admittedly the bats nesting overhead might have put him off his stroke, but he would have braved them, just as he would have braved wearing his heart on his sleeve with a few well-chosen quotes and long, heart-pulling, groin-buzzing kisses.

She found it alienating the way Francis seemed to control his passion and curb his emotions these days. She’d always been the
more outspoken, impulsive one of the two, shooting her mouth off and daring to be different. Francis had traditionally chauffeured life forwards like a pro while she rode shotgun. He’d kept his foot on the accelerator throughout their relationship, turning fantasy into reality as he prepared the ground for their publishing dynasty, their wedding, their family life together. She sensed he was still in the driving seat, but now he was going round in circles, not slowing down long enough to pick up passengers or listen to directions.

She heard a door slam and looked down to see a figure setting out up the steep cobbled lane, dark hair gleaming in the first rays of sun that were now stealing over the woods at the village brow which screened off the estate walls, car park and the inland hills. It was Byrne, Fink the basset hound waddling behind.

Legs’ feet itched to pull on trainers and run after him. But she forced herself to stay and watch as he strode off, his hands in pockets and head bowed, so deep in thought that he almost walked straight into the very same lamp-post beneath which he had demonstrated the meaninglessness of saying ‘I love you’ the night before. Now he stopped and looked up at it briefly while Fink lifted his leg at its base before both carried on with their dawn dog walk. He had his own demons, Legs told herself, and he’d made it clear he didn’t want her complicating his life, whatever little of it he had left. He had kissed her just once, and even though it had felt like a whole new world to her, it had been a kiss goodbye.

Stamping into the shower, she remembered his parting words last night. ‘Go back to your lover in London.’

The cool, high-pressure water rained down on her head, rattling her unspoken thoughts to the surface.

She didn’t want to go back to Conrad. Nor was she yet certain she wanted to stay for Francis. Meeting Byrne had made her want something else entirely and as always, the thing she wanted most of all was the one thing she couldn’t have. He’d told her that he was about to lose his life, repeatedly insisting she must leave, said ‘I love you’ without meaning it just to prove a point, yet she felt as though
the past forty-eight hours had opened up that part of her heart which had been cauterised for years.

She distractedly washed her hair with body scrub and rubbed volume-enhancing conditioner into her armpits.

If she hadn’t met Byrne that weekend, she realised, she would almost certainly have hot-headededly rushed straight back Francis’s arms. She was frightened by the damage she’d already done. As her mother said, she owed it to Francis to try to recapture what they’d once had. But how could they hope to recapture it when just a year apart had pushed such estrangement between them?

And now she had to go back to London and to Conrad. She’d done what he asked. Gordon Lapis was on the Farcombe bill. She should feel delighted by the result, but she felt as though she’d traded her heart like a counterfeit note.

She stepped out of the shower and wrapped her oddly gritty hair in a towel before crossing the main room to check her phone.

Francis had texted her very late last night.
Say the word. ILY.

Was he making a romantic statement or dictating ‘the word’, Legs wondered. She found she couldn’t reply, still raw from Byrne’s lecture about how easy it was to say ‘I Love You’. The only three-letter acronym in her head right now was SOS. A well brought up man like Francis would interpret it as ‘Save Our Souls’, but Legs was a texting veteran whose many quick exchanges with friends like Daisy included the phrase SOS or ‘Same Old Shit’. And she was definitely up to her neck in it this time.

Running away from Francis and back to Conrad again made the rock and the hard place seem indistinguishable. For now, she reached for her battered Nikes and decided to simply run.

Setting off for a final breezy jog along the cliff-path before the drive to Somerset and on to London, Legs’ heart seemed to set down markers with every footfall as she breathed in the familiar sea air, hating the thought of leaving, wishing more than anything that
she could stay and sort things out with Francis. She couldn’t hope to say everything she needed to over breakfast. In her head, she had an image of herself weeping penitently over a bowl of muesli, crying ‘sorry, sorry, sorry!’ over again.

The thought of trying to make her mother and Hector see sense was another vast thorn in her side that gave her a stitch as she ran.

When she then swallowed two flies and crashed through a cow pat, Legs realised she craved Ealing Common with its neat, flat paths and poop scoop vigilantes. Before embracing that, she was equally eager to talk to Daisy, to spill beans and seek magic advice.

Running back into Farcombe from the top lane, she detoured via the Visitors’ Centre public car park at the top of the village to fetch the Honda, knowing that she would have a hefty fine to pay for abandoning it there most of the weekend.

But the little red rust-bucket was missing altogether. Its broken door must have made it easy pickings for a car thief, she realised with a wail of dismay, imagining her longtime driving companion now discarded and torched on a beach somewhere.

Furious, Legs stomped back to the Book Inn, where Nonny was manning the reception desk computer, updating the guests’ bills with last night’s dinner and bar tabs. ‘Everything OK?’

‘Somebody’s stolen my car!’

‘No, it’s cool. The man from the garage just dropped it off.’ Nonny reached behind her for a padded envelope which she handed over. ‘Better get it moved before the good bergers of Farcombe march on us. You know how officious the Parish Council are about illegal parking on the quayside.’

Inside the envelope were a set of Honda keys. Although these looked almost identical to her own, they were far less scuffed and dog-eared, and were attached to a large luggage tag which read: ‘take outside and point at the sea.’

Intrigued, she did as instructed, pressing the ‘unlock’ button.

There was a chirrup immediately beside her, making Legs
jump. A shiny silver car was parked beneath the Book Inn’s swinging hanging baskets, already covered in brightly jewelled petals. It was the same size and shape as hers, but far less battered.

She peered through the windows and let out a shriek, because inside was all the clutter and detritus from her own runabout, neatly stacked up on the rear seat. When she opened the door to investigate further, breathing in leather upholstery and newly valeted carpets, the log and an insurance certificate were on the passenger’s seat, both in her name.

She rushed back inside the pub to corner Nonny. ‘What do you know about that car?’

‘Just that it was delivered here while you were out running. Isn’t it yours?’

Legs raked urgently through all the paperwork and the contents of the padded envelope, but there was no explanation whatsoever.

She checked through her phone messages: Ros entreating her not to be late bringing Nico home; Daisy telling her to arrive after midday because they’d been up half the night and wanted a lie-in; Conrad asking her to ring him urgently; Francis saying that he’d just called into the Book Inn for breakfast with a surprise for her, and where was she?

She dashed down to the restaurant and then into the bar, but he was no longer there.

Running back out past the still unlocked car, its passenger door wide open and an eager seagull pecking at the trim, she panted her way up the cliff path and through the parkland to the hall, her heart on fire.

That’s why he’d conducted that strange conversation about her car last night, she realised. He must have been planning this surprise all along. Byrne was totally wrong about Francis. This was a gesture of love, not revenge. He was the same man she’d loved for all those years. Francis had never been one for jewels or flowers; it was typical of him to be so pragmatic, and she found it wildly
romantic. He
did
still love her. This was better than a moonlit serenade outside her window any day.

She belted through the parterre, hurdling the box hedges and scratching her ankles on the rose bushes, sending pea gravel flying as she raced around the side of the house and bombed along the raised terrace.

Francis was sitting in the kitchen with a pile of newspapers, blond hair flopping over his forehead as he flipped through them. There was more coverage of the Gordon Lapis story in almost every national that morning, along with lots of mentions of the Farcombe Festival. Speculation was rife about the true identity of the Ptolemy Finch creator.

He looked up and smiled when she panted up to the open French doors from the courtyard, as though he’d been expecting her at just that moment. ‘There you are. Come in. There’s fresh coffee and Imee’s amazing pains au chocolat.’

Stepping in through the doors, Legs was too puffed out to be able to speak properly. ‘My car!’ was all she managed to wheeze.

‘Is there something wrong with it?’

‘No – it’s lovely! Just lovely! It’s the loveliest thing imaginable.’

‘Well that’s all lovely then,’ he smiled humouringly then returned to the
Mail,
which had dedicated two pages to the Gordon Lapis true identity story and a list of suspects. ‘Christ, they’ve even got odds here on Lapis being Jeffrey Archer.’

Legs had a brief and unpleasant vision of live-messaging ‘sleep tight’ wishes to Jeffrey Archer the previous night.

Francis had already poured her a coffee and placed it in front of the chair beside him.

She hesitated and then gave into temptation. It was so strange settling back into her old place at the Farcombe table as though the past year hadn’t happened. She couldn’t stop thinking about the car; such a romantic thing to do after he’d told her how worried he was about her safety in her red rust bucket last night. She felt a brief pang of loyalty to her old banger, but it was instantly eclipsed
by happiness again, just as all thoughts of Conrad were shrouded in sea mist, increasingly reluctant to be blown inland. She and Francis could get back to their glory days, she was certain. They’d prove Byrne wrong, with his secrets and manipulative ways. Kissing Byrne had been a huge mistake. He had been right about that one fact, at least.

She desperately wanted to talk to Francis about where they stood, but Édith chose that moment to reel into the room wearing a long silk dressing gown, her face putty grey behind huge dark glasses.

‘Legs, darling, back so soon – did you sleep on the doorstep?’ She headed for the fridge. ‘Christ I’m hungover. We really shouldn’t have started on the cognacs after Poppy went to bed. Jax says she’s paralysed, but I think she’s just still paralytic.’

‘Was there a terrible argument about the thing in the cellar then?’ Legs asked.

‘What “thing” in the cellar?’ Édith asked, pulling out a carton of tomato juice.

Francis shot Legs a murderous look. ‘Just the dodgy fusebox, Dits; I’ll get someone in.’

‘There
was
a furious row last night,’ Édith said, alighting on a chair at the far end of the kitchen with a waft of flying silk like a heron. ‘But it was about your chum Jamie-go and Kizzy.’ She looked up, one eyebrow angled.

Legs felt a chill run through her. ‘So they
do
know each other?’

‘Of course not,’ Francis snapped.

‘Jax thinks they’re rival bounty hunters,’ Édith sipped her tomato juice and pulled a face, closing her eyes and breathing to herself ‘think vodka,’ before shuddering and carrying on. ‘Both are after Poppy’s dough with their doe eyes and doggy bags.’

‘I don’t think Byrne’s after her money,’ Legs insisted, earning another dark look from Francis.

‘And Kizzy says she just wants her “lurve”,’ Édith sniped, casting her red juice aside, ‘but she’s a bright enough girl to know that’s
impossible; Poppy’s no more capable of showing real love than she is of leaving this house. Her heart’s as agoraphobic as she is. She should never have played matchmaker between you two. Kizzy only went along with it to please her.’