The Older Man (10 page)

“Yes,” Rennie said. “Yes, of course. I can start today if you like. Now, in fact.”

“You’re sure?”

“Absolutely. I’ll be there in about half an hour.”

“Make it an hour,” Grant told her. “I can hold the fort until then. I’ll drive Toby to school and take the morning off to show you the ropes and ease Ellen into the new situation.”

Ellen accepted with apparent equanimity that Rennie was going to take Mrs Beddoe’s place, and even let her father go to work with a minimum of fuss, although afterwards she wouldn’t let go of Rennie, and insisted on being read story after story until Rennie was hoarse.

Rennie suggested a walk, but Ellen shook her head decisively. Games and a sleep were similarly vetoed. Finally Ellen took her thumb from her mouth and said, “Make a cake.”

They were in the middle of it, both of them liberally sprinkled with flour, Ellen’s hands happily covered in sticky dough, when she said suddenly, “Daddy said Mummy died because she was sick.”

Rennie carefully continued scraping the wooden spoon in her hand with a knife. “Daddy’s right,” she said.

“He said she didn’t want to go away.”

“I’m sure she wanted to stay with you and Toby,” Rennie told her firmly. “But sometimes, no matter how much we want to, we can’t stay with the people we love.”

“Daddy said he loves us very much.”

“Yes, darling, he does. He always loved you, even when he wasn’t living with you.”

“He said he’s going to live with us for always, now.” Ellen lifted her hands and spread the pudgy fingers. “My hands is all gooey, Rennie.”

“That’s all right. We’ll put some flour on them and it will come off easily.”

Rennie spun the process of baking out as long as she could, and afterwards Ellen consented to having an afternoon nap. She was still asleep when Toby came home from school. Rennie gave him juice and a cracker with cheese, and listened to him read from a school reading book.

“What are we having for tea?” he asked her.

“Steak,” she told him. She had found some in the freezer.

“Can we have gravy?”

“Do you like gravy?”

Toby nodded. “Mrs Beddoe makes lots of gravy. She puts stuff in it.”

“What sort of stuff?”

“I’ll show you.” He led the way into the kitchen and pointed. “Up there.”

Rennie opened the high cupboard he had indicated. It was full of sauces, pickles and flavourings.

“I’ll lift you up,” she suggested, “and you show me which one.”

He knelt on the counter under the cupboard and peered into the cupboard. “This one!” he said at last, and made a grab for a bottle of soya sauce. As he pulled it out, it knocked against an adjacent bottle of tomato sauce, which fell to the bench and smashed, splashing its contents over Toby, Rennie, the counter and finally the floor, where it spread around the broken pieces of the bottle.

“Don’t move, Toby!” Rennie said sharply, as the boy seemed about to overbalance. She lifted him and swung him away from the mess and onto the floor, taking the soya sauce bottle gently from his hand.

He had gone pale, and his eyes widened and filled with tears. “I didn’t mean to!” he said. “I didn’t mean to be naughty! I didn’t!”

“You weren’t naughty!” Rennie assured him. “It was an accident, that’s all. I wasn’t angry with you, I just didn’t want you to cut yourself.” She pulled a paper towel from the roll on the wall and began wiping some of the tomato sauce off his clothes.

Toby sniffed. “It was a accident,” he repeated, evidently not very convinced.

“Yes, it was. Everyone has accidents sometimes. You didn’t do anything wrong.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “You’ve got tomato sauce on you, too.”

“I know. I bet I look funny!” she added lightly. “You do. Your father will think we’re a couple of sausages.”

But he wasn’t to be laughed out of it. “Will he be angry?” he asked fearfully.

“No, of course he won’t. It wasn’t your fault, Toby. And it’ll wash off. Don’t worry about it.”

By the time Grant came home she had Toby’s clothes soaking in the laundry, and had sponged the worst of the stains off her own T-shirt and jeans. But Grant’s eyebrows rose as she greeted him. “What happened to you?”

Before she could answer, Ellen flew past her and Grant bent to lift the child into his arms. As Ellen buried her face in his shoulder, he looked at Rennie again. “Is someone hurt?” he asked sharply. “Where’s Toby?”

“It’s all right,” she said. “It’s not blood, it’s tomato sauce. Toby’s in his room, getting into some clean clothes.”

“Clean clothes? He had clean clothes this morning. Is he covered in tomato sauce, too, by any chance?”

“By some chance,” Rennie admitted. “Don’t growl at him, will you? It was an accident.”

“I certainly hope so,” Grant said mildly. “What makes you think I’d growl at him?”

“I don’t. But he seemed very anxious, as though he expected someone would.”

“I’ll go and talk to him. Oh, do you want to leave now? It’s well after five.”

Ellen, who had been silently hugging her father, suddenly twisted in his arms. “No!”

Rennie looked at her panic-stricken face and went to her swiftly. “It’s all right, Ellen, I’ll come back tomorrow.”

“No! Don’t go ‘way, Rennie! Don’t go ‘way!”

None of Rennie’s or her father’s reassurances could console her, and she became more and more frantic, until Grant, prising her arms away from Rennie’s neck, told Rennie, “Just go. She’ll settle down eventually.”

Ellen was screaming, now, her cheeks red with weeping. Grant’s face was taut with strain. “Stop it, Ellen!” he said sternly, his arms close about her as she flailed against him. “That’s enough, sweetheart. Come on, now.”

Toby had come out of his room and was standing in the doorway, watching. Reluctantly, Rennie started towards the door with her bag.

Toby looked at her. “Is Ellen being naughty?” he asked nervously.

“No, Toby.” Rennie went down on her knees. “She’s just upset because I have to go home.”

“Why do you have to?” he asked. His gaze was almost accusing, and Rennie felt like a deserter.

“I’ll be back tomorrow,” she said again. “I’ll be here every day.”

“That’s what Mrs Beddoe said.”

And Mrs Beddoe, of course, had instead flown to her daughter’s side. Quite rightly and naturally, but how could Toby and Ellen be expected to understand?

She gave Toby a hug and stood up to leave. Ellen’s screams had increased in volume, and Grant was just holding her tightly, alternately shushing her and murmuring into her ear, his own expression tortured.

“I don’t have to go,” Rennie heard herself saying to Grant. “You’ve got a spare room, haven’t you?”

She saw the quick hope in his face, that he extinguished immediately. “We can’t expect that from you. Go on home.”

“No.” She crossed the room again and before she even got there Ellen had flung herself into her arms. She sat down with the child on the nearest armchair and began stroking her hair.

“She’ll have to learn eventually,” Grant said, rubbing a hand through his own hair, “that she can’t get everyone to do what she wants by screaming about it.”

Rennie shook her head. “It’s more than that.” She glanced down at Ellen, who had stopped screaming but was sobbing heavily, and wetting Rennie’s already abused T-shirt with her tears. “We can’t talk about it now. But I’ll phone home and ask Shane to bring over my toothbrush and pyjamas. And a change of clothes,” she added ruefully.

Toby came over to the chair and stared at his sister, then at Rennie. “Are you going to stay?” he asked.

“Yes,” Rennie answered, as Grant said, “No.”

Rennie and Toby both looked at him, and Ellen burrowed closer to Rennie, one hand gripping the sleeve of her T-shirt.

“I think I am,” Rennie said calmly, still looking at Grant.

“There’s no need — we can’t — ” Grant started. Then he shrugged. “What are your parents going to say?”

Rennie smiled. “That I’m doing the only thing possible. They certainly won’t think that you’ve seduced me, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Relief warred with doubt in his face. “I shouldn’t let you,” he said. “But thank you.”

After the children had been put to bed, Rennie made up the bed in the spare room, refusing Grant’s offer of help. When she came back into the lounge, Shane was there, swinging an overnight bag in one hand, and talking to Grant.

“I didn’t hear you come in,” she said, taking the bag from him. “Thanks for bringing my things.”

“No problem.”

Grant said, “Can I offer you a drink or something?”

Shane shook his head. “Not while I’ve got the car, thanks. Mum would have my guts for garters.”

“Not necessarily alcoholic,” Grant said. “Coffee, maybe, with some of your sister’s cake?”

“Rennie’s been making cakes?”

“Ellen and I,” Rennie told him. “She wanted to make one for her father.”

“I can recommend it,” Grant told him. “And you’d be helping me out. If my daughter insists on baking too regularly, I’m likely to develop a serious weight problem. I have to eat her cakes so as not to hurt her feelings, but I’m sure she won’t mind if I offer some to Rennie’s brother.”

In the end the three of them sat over coffee and cake and talked for a couple of hours. Grant seemed more relaxed than Rennie remembered seeing him, and he spoke to Shane as an equal, although her brother was so much younger. When he had gone, and she came back to the kitchen to find Grant rinsing cups and putting them on the draining board, he said, “A nice lad, your brother.”

“He liked you, too,” she answered, automatically taking a tea-towel from the rail and beginning to dry.

“We can leave them to drain if you like.”

“It’ll only take a minute, and I can put them away. I was thinking — “

“Yes?”

“You said you’d have preferred someone living in. I could, you know. Then Ellen needn’t be afraid that I won’t come back the next day. I’ll be right here.”

Grant said doubtfully. “Maybe pandering to her isn’t the right thing — “

“It isn’t pandering. She lost her mother, and then Mrs Beddoe.” She didn’t add that her father’s leaving hadn’t helped. Grant knew it already. “She doesn’t trust anyone to stay around any more. The world’s a scary place for her. She needs absolute security for a while, surely? Someone who’s always there. And you can’t be. You have to work.”

“I’ve been wondering if I should give it up. Stay home and be a father.”

“And live on the Domestic Purposes Benefit? Your standard of living would drop drastically, wouldn’t it? The children’s too. More alterations to their lives. There’s no need for that. As long as I’m here — “

“And how long will that be? The children will come to depend on you more than they do now, and then your holidays will be over and you’ll go back to university.”

“Leave that aside for the moment. I won’t let you down. Mrs Beddoe may be back by then. And in three months Ellen might be her normal self. I’ll do my best to see she doesn’t remain dependent on me.”

“Did you talk to Toby?” Rennie asked, putting away the last cup.

“Yes. I hope I said the right things.”

She told him about her conversation with Ellen. “I hope I said the right things, too.”

“Sounds fine to me. You’re young to be so wise.”

“It’s just common sense,” Rennie answered crisply. She wished he wouldn’t keep reminding her of her comparative youth.

He rinsed out the sink and dried his hands, straightening the towel on its rail afterwards. Watching, she said, “You’re very domesticated, aren’t you?”

Grant glanced up. “I’ve had to learn, living on my own, since I don’t enjoy inhabiting a pigsty.”

“Did Jean do it all before the divorce?” She caught herself up immediately. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.”

“It’s okay.” He looked wry. “Jean was a perfectionist in everything. She made me feel incompetent. No,” he amended quickly. “That’s unfair. I was incompetent. My parents believed that the man was supposed to be the breadwinner, that housework and babies were women’s work. So I’d never been taught any skills in that area. My bungling efforts to help understandably irritated her. It was easier to do everything herself than try to teach me how. She was extremely efficient.”

Rennie remembered the neighbour who had talked of her own feelings of inadequacy compared with Jean. She looked about the kitchen. There were still traces of flour on the floor under the table where she’d missed sweeping them up after the baking session. In a corner near the stove she saw a piece of jigsaw puzzle, and on the bench was a little heap of paper, a board book and some crayons that she had moved hastily from the table when she’d given Toby and Ellen an afternoon snack and Ellen had spilled some milk.

Recalling the neatly folded clothing and undies in the children’s drawers, the labelled shelves for their toys and books, she didn’t suppose she came anywhere near Jean’s standards of housekeeping.

“Was she a career homemaker?”

“She made herself into one,” Grant replied. “She was studying law when we met. The plan was that she would complete her degree after we married, and then we’d start a family. It didn’t quite happen that way.”

“Toby?”

“Yes, Toby came along unexpectedly, and Jean left university to be a fulltime mother.”

“Her decision, or a joint one?” Rennie asked softly, struck by a terseness in his tone.

He hesitated. “Hers, in the end. But there had been a lot of acrimonious discussion beforehand. I told her we could get babysitters or use a creche so she could finish her studies. But apart from the complications of taking a difficult degree under such conditions, which she pointed out — and she was quite right — Jean didn’t believe in letting other people bring up her kids. At first she regarded the pregnancy as a tragedy. She even talked of abortion. That led to a major row that lasted for weeks. I still don’t know if I talked her out of it or she changed her mind when she felt the baby moving.”

“And now you wonder if you were wrong,” Rennie suggested.

“It wasn’t as though her health was at stake,” he said. “And it was my baby, too. I promised I’d support her all the way if she wanted to study part-time, or go back to university when Toby went to school. But then, I wasn’t the one having to carry the child, and put my career goals on hold.”