The Queen of New Beginnings (17 page)

Unlike Rufus, who, stuck with his lacklustre mother and Alice for conversation, was clearly having a miserable time. Alice had tried to engage him in conversation, but no matter what she said—and given the circumstances, she thought she was being remarkable big-hearted—he wasn’t interested. His attention was focused entirely on Isabel. Every now and then she would slide a glance in his direction and beam a dazzling smile at him.

They had moved onto dessert when Rufus clinked his spoon against his glass. “I have an announcement,” he said. They all turned and looked at him. “I was going to wait until Christmas Day, but I’ve never been known for my patience, so here goes. Isabel and I are going to be married.”

There was a momentary silence. Not one of them had seen that coming. Not even Isabel, from the startled expression on her face.

“Well, isn’t anyone going to congratulate us?” Rufus demanded.

“Of course, darling,” Julia said quickly. “We’re all absolutely delighted for you; it’s just that it’s…it’s so sudden. You’ve taken us completely by surprise.”

At the other end of the table, Bruce laughed raucously. He reached out to Isabel and placed a hand on her forearm. “Isabel, do you have any idea what you’re letting yourself in for by marrying Rufus? If I were you, I’d start running. Oh, take that look off your face, Rufus, I’m only joking. You can take a joke, can’t you?”

At breakfast the next morning, Tasha said, “I know a good joke. Would you like to hear it, Isabel? It’s about Alice and Rufus.”

Alice froze. As did Rufus.

“Shut up, Tasha,” he said.

“That’s no way to speak to me, Rufus. Not on Christmas Eve. It is supposed to be the season of good will, after all. Honestly, Isabel, you’ll love my joke. Take no notice of Rufus. Actually, Alice knows the joke better than me; she should tell it to you really. Alice?”

“I think I’ll pass on breakfast,” Alice murmured. She pushed back her chair and stood up. She was halfway to the door when her father came in. “Dad,” she said, “why don’t you show Isabel your darkroom?” She fixed him with a wildly frantic look, praying that he’d catch on, that he was entering a potential war zone and needed to get out fast, preferably taking Isabel with him to avoid an almighty showdown.

“You must be telepathic, Alice,” he said brightly, “I was just going to ask Isabel if she’d like to take a look.”

For once Rufus was in agreement and practically hustled Isabel out of her seat. The perfect guest, Isabel merely frowned prettily and went along with what was being suggested. When she was safely out of ear shot, Rufus said, “Alice, don’t go. We need to talk.” He closed the door, blocking her escape.

“Oh, well if you two are going to have a cosy tête-à-tête,” Tasha said offhandedly, “I’ll leave you to it.”

Her brother turned on her. “The fuck you will! Now sit down and tell me what the hell you thought you were playing at?”

Tasha’s mouth dropped. She couldn’t have looked more shocked if Rufus had physically struck her. She quickly rallied, though. “I just think your future wife should be aware that you screwed her future sister-in-law then dumped her. Don’t you?”

“Why, Tasha?” Rufus replied. “Why would you think that was a good idea?” He turned to Alice. “Is this your doing? Have you put her up to this as an act of revenge?”

“No! The last thing I want is for anyone else knowing how you humiliated me.”

His eyes narrowed. “I didn’t humiliate you, Alice. You and I had a bit of a thing for a while and then I came to my senses and finished it with you. End of story.”

“If that’s all it amounted to, why don’t you tell Isabel that?”

“Oh, don’t be obtuse! From the outside looking in, it looks a darn sight worse than it really is, you being my stepsister.”

Alice tried not to flinch at his casual dismissal for her love for him. “It doesn’t look so good from the inside looking out, if you want my opinion.”

Rufus started furiously pacing the length of the kitchen. “Is this what you’re going to do for the rest of my life? Hold me accountable for a moment of madness?”

“I’m not doing anything!” Alice had to stop herself from screaming the words in his face. “If I could take a pill to make me forget what we did, then I’d take it right now. I’d take a whole bloody bottle of pills if it meant I could wipe you completely from my memory! And in case you’ve forgotten, it was Tasha who wanted to reveal our dirty little secret, not me.”

He swung his gaze round to his sister. She stared back at him with a determined and defiant expression. “I just think you should be honest with the woman you’re going to marry, Rufus,” she said. “How would you feel if Isabel concealed something like this from you?”

He went over to her. “Tasha,” he said, his tone suddenly soft. He rested his hands on her shoulders. “I’ll give you anything you want, I’ll
do
anything you want, so long as you never breathe a word of this to Isabel. I don’t want to lose her. She means the world to me and I don’t want anything to spoil my happiness. Do you understand that?”

“But how can you be sure that you love her, or that she loves you? You’ve known her for no more than a few months. Why do you—” Tasha’s voice cracked. “Why do you always have to go and change things?”

He took her in his arms. “Oh, Tash, it doesn’t matter how long you’ve known someone when it’s the real deal.”

She tilted her head back to look up at him. “But wasn’t that how you felt about Alice?”

Wishing she was invisible, Alice moved quietly towards the door to escape. She didn’t want to hear Rufus’s reply. Hadn’t she been put through enough already? But she was too slow.

“What I feel for Isabel couldn’t be more different from what I felt for Alice,” he said. He glanced over to Alice. “And that’s the truth.”

“Fine,” she said. She opened the door and fled. Her eyes brimming with tears, she ran upstairs, passed Julia on the landing and nearly knocked her flying. She locked herself in her room and lay on the bed, exhausted. Dr. Whittaker had warned her that she shouldn’t overdo it, that it took a long time to fully recover from glandular fever. How about a broken heart? How long did that take?

She fell into a deep, dreamless sleep and two hours later she awoke to an eye-opening revelation. It was no longer her heart that needed mending; it was her pride. She sat up and explored this thought further. She didn’t love Rufus anymore. She didn’t know when it had happened, but her feelings for him had changed. They must have changed because how else would she have been able to cope with the last twenty-four hours if she’d still been in love with him? No, what was hurting now was her pride. It was the shame of knowing she had allowed herself to be treated so shabbily that hurt. Well, it was time to hold her head up high again. Because if she didn’t, the alternative was to turn into an emotional wreck like Julia. She would rather die than do that.

Buoyed up with a new inner strength, she slid off the bed and went over to the turret. Staring out of the window, she took in the grey half-light of the day. The end of the garden and the surrounding moorland was hidden by thick freezing fog. There was no sign of the sun. It was by far the gloomiest Christmas Eve Alice had known. Snow was predicted for tomorrow. A white Christmas. Would that cheer them all up?

She thought of Rufus’s shock announcement last night at dinner. From the expression of surprise on Isabel’s face, Alice didn’t think they had agreed to break the news that evening. Maybe Isabel had wanted to tell her parents first.

As a result of the announcement, they had learned a lot more about Isabel. Like Alice, she was an only child and her mother lived in America with her third husband—she had been widowed twice before. Isabel had grown up in Norfolk in a house that sounded straight out of a Bertie Wooster story with its house parties and grouse shoots. Two years ago Isabel’s mother had met a New York financier, eighteen years older than her, and had moved to live in a place called the Hamptons. Alice had never heard of it but Rufus clearly had because he said he was really looking forward to going there with Isabel. Isabel described her mother’s new home as being excessively overstated, but infinitely more civilised than the freezing cold mausoleum in Norfolk where she had grown up.

Alice’s breath had formed a patch of condensation on the window. She wiped the pane of glass and below her in the garden she saw two figures emerge from the fog: her father and Isabel. In his hands was a camera and he was pointing it at Isabel. Dressed in a thick scarf wound loosely around her neck and what Alice recognized as her father’s tattered duffel coat, Isabel was striking a series of comical poses. Bruce moved slowly about her, capturing her every pose, her every angle. Walking backwards, he beckoned her towards him, all the while the camera placed firmly to his eye. Recalling how only last night Alice had said that her father rarely took photographs of people, preferring penguins and snow-capped mountains to human beings any day, she felt a shadow of unease settle on her. She shivered and took a step back from the window. But not before a kaleidoscope of faded memories flashed before her.

She pressed a finger to her top lip and tapped it. He wouldn’t. Oh, dear God, he absolutely wouldn’t.

Would he?

• • •

Seldom did Alice’s father encourage guests to visit Cuckoo House, but for the last three years, much to Julia’s horror, as well as Tasha and Rufus’s disgust, he had invited George to join them for Christmas lunch. She always turned up late, tricked out in an actual dress and with a bottle of her famously noxious home brew. Today was no exception. She was introduced to Isabel and Alice could see Rufus cringing that his precious wife-to-be was being forced to rub shoulders with such a fright. But Isabel took George in her elegant stride and was as charmingly interested in her as she had been with the rest of them. “You keep chickens? How wonderful! That’s what I intend to do one day. How many do you have? And what about foxes? Do have much of a problem with them?”

“I shoot the blighters. I hope you’re not one of those lily-livered types who objects to such things.”

“Good Lord, no! My stepfather taught me to shoot when I was ten years old.”

“I think shooting’s barbaric,” remarked Tasha.

“You wouldn’t think that if you’d found your henhouse had been massacred by some mangy, flea-ridden fox. Bruce, haven’t you taught this girl anything about living in the country?”

Bruce held up his hands. “Not my bailiwick, George. Any complaints should be directed to her mother.”

• • •

It was after lunch, during present-giving time, when everyone was groaning from having eaten too much and flinging wrapping paper in all directions, that they took their places for the opening scene of the final act of the drama they were caught up in. Alice had always wondered just how much of what followed could have been avoided had it not been for those bloody cherry liqueurs.

With his customary air of indifference, Alice’s father handed Julia a present. He didn’t wish her a Happy Christmas, nor did she utter a word of thanks. Alice watched her picking uninterestedly at the sticky tape. When Julia finally had the paper off, she looked over to where Bruce was sitting next to Alice. “Why?” she asked. “Why have you given me a box of cherry liqueurs when you know I hate them?”

“Do you?” he said with exaggerated astonishment. “Since when?”

“Since forever. Since before the very first time you gave me a box and all the times since.” Her voice had spiralled to an embarrassing high-pitched whine.

Bruce shrugged his shoulders. “Oh, well, I’ll see if I can do better next year. But why don’t you try one? Who knows, you might find you like them. People do change.”

“Some people will never change and that’s the greatest disappointment of my life!” She flung the box across the room at him. It caught him on the chest then dropped to the floor at his feet. She ran from the room.

“Bruce Barrett, you are such a bastard,” Rufus said. He rose slowly from the sofa where he was sitting with Isabel. “Chocolates. Is that all you think my mother’s worth? A box of chocolates you know perfectly well she doesn’t like?” He moved towards the offending box. He lifted a foot and they all knew what he was going to do next.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Bruce said quietly.

Rufus brought his foot down with a vicious stamp and crushed the box. He then turned to Isabel. “I want you to know here and now, Isabel, you will not be subjected to this vile man’s company ever again. This will be the last time we come here.”

“Oh, don’t talk such rubbish, young man.”

It was George who had spoken. Rufus glared at her with contempt. “No one asked you for your opinion, you filthy, mad old hag.”

“Rufus!” This was from Isabel. She looked genuinely horrified. “You can’t speak to a guest like that.”

“She isn’t a guest,” he responded hotly. “She’s a hanger-on. The local crazy woman.”

George smiled happily at the description but Alice was incensed. “Rufus,” she said, “apologize to George immediately.”

Rufus laughed. “You have to be out of your mind. Hell will freeze over before I apologize to her.”

“Then I suggest you leave.”

“Isabel and I will leave when we’re good and ready.”

Alice got to her feet. She squared up to Rufus. “Isabel is perfectly welcome to stay as long as she wants, but you,” she pointed a finger at him “are not.”

He laughed. He actually laughed. “Oh, do us all a favour and shut up, Alice.”

“Don’t tell me what to do in my own house.”

Tasha joined in. “It isn’t your house, Alice, so stop telling Rufus what to do.”

Alice managed a wan smile. “Actually, Tasha, this house does belong to me, so I’m perfectly entitled to say who is welcome and who is not. And right now, your brother isn’t.”

Both Tasha and Rufus stared at her.

“Yes, you did hear me correctly. Cuckoo House became mine when I turned eighteen. So if I were you, I’d start behaving yourselves.” She turned to Isabel. “I’m sorry you’ve had to witness this ugly scene, but as my father warned you, you really ought to know what kind of a family you’re marrying into. Oh, and by the way, Rufus and I slept together on my eighteenth birthday. Ask him about it. He’ll tell you it was all very casual and meaningless. Well, it was on his part. I made the same mistake as you; I fell in love with him. Hard to fathom how or why now.”

Isabel’s eyes grew wide and she stared at Rufus.

“You bitch!” He shouted at Alice. “You total sodding bitch!”

“I’m warning you, Rufus, speak to my daughter like that again and you’ll regret it.”

As if heeding the warning from Alice’s father, Rufus took a moment to compose himself. “Tasha, Isabel,” he said, “come on, let’s leave them to it.”

Tasha was immediately at her brother’s side, but as Rufus grabbed her hand and pulled her from the sofa, Isabel appeared less sure. At the door, she hesitated. Alice smiled at her, hoping to convey a look of understanding, that she knew Isabel was caught between a rock and a hard place.

“Are you coming, Isabel?” Rufus was glowering furiously.

“Yes,” she said.

“Bravo, Alice!” Her father said when they were alone.

Alice sighed. “Thanks, Dad. Sorry I had to pull rank on you. You know, telling them about the house.”

“Think nothing of it. It was time it was said.”

Alice picked up the crushed box of chocolates.

“How about a drink?” Bruce offered. “George, I expect you’d like something after all that, wouldn’t you? I know I do.”