Almost Love

by Christina James

  “It is just someone walking by,” she whispered.

  “No,” he whispered back, “It isn’t. I heard the footsteps walk along the towpath beyond the bridge, then turn and walk back again. They are pacing the ground below us now. They aren’t moving on.”

  Alex listened.

  “You’re right. But what is there to be afraid of?”

  Edmund shrugged and attempted a smile, but she saw that his face was taut with fear.

  “I just don’t want anyone to find this place, that’s all. We mustn’t give ourselves away.” He reached out a hand to take hers and she saw that he was shaking. She realised that he was not telling her the whole truth and normally that would have made her angry, but his fear had infected her and she too felt terrified. She gripped his hand.

  “What’s that?” she whispered.

  “I can’t hear anything.”

  “Neither can I; but I can smell cigarette smoke. Whoever it is, is still there.”

  “You’re right. I can smell it, too.”

  They crouched in silence. After a while they heard a scuffing sound; then the footsteps again. An arc of light swept across the doorway and vanished, then swept back towards them. The smell of rising smoke was stronger now.

  “They’ve got a torch,” whispered Alex.

  “It’s all right – you can’t see the doorway from below, even in daylight.”

  The arc of light came and went again. And once again. Then, slowly, the footsteps continued along the towpath. This time they did not return.

  “They’ve gone!” said Alex quietly, but no longer whispering.

  “Shh!” said Edmund. “We’ll stay a little longer. It’s going to take us a while to get down from here and I want to make quite sure first that they aren’t coming back.”

  “Why are you so frightened?”

  “No particular reason,” said Edmund evasively, “except that it’s dark and lonely on the river bank and anyone prepared to walk along there on a night like this is probably up to no good. It’s not fear, so much as apprehensiveness – and as I said, I don’t want anyone else to find this place. Another drink?”

  Unnerved by the whole experience, Alex held out her cup. Edmund sloshed it half-full of rum and then added a little coke. It was even stronger than the first drink, but she didn’t protest. She drank it rapidly, feeling her head swim before she had even finished it. Edmund had downed his in one go.

  “Another?”

  “Not yet,” she said. “Don’t forget we’ve got to climb back down to the path. I’d rather not be too drunk; it would be nasty, falling down that slope on to the footpath.”

  Edmund nodded, but poured more rum for himself. She noticed that he added no coke. He was sipping this drink more slowly, however. She caught his expression by the light of the storm lantern. Craven was the word that occurred to her. She decided to try to take his mind off whatever was frightening him so much.

  “You really should tell the museum about this place – or the county, if the museum’s not interested – and get it properly excavated. It’s very unusual.”

  “I know that. I feel reluctant to do so, though. Over the years, I’ve come to regard it as my special place. It’s a secret that I’ve barely shared.”

  “You’ve never brought Krystyna here?”

  “God, no, she wouldn’t be interested. Neither my career nor my personal interests are of any concern to her. I’m just a walking bill-payer. Still, I suppose that’s what the word ‘husband’ meant originally – or an approximation of what it meant, anyway.”

  “You sound very bitter . . . and I’m sure that you exaggerate. She must be quite proud of you and what you have achieved.”

  “I wouldn’t bank on it. As you must yourself realise, archaeology is fascinating to few people except archaeologists – discounting the charisma enjoyed by the television charlatans, of course. My marriage hasn’t been successful, but it’s my own fault; I married a pretty face and there’s the end of it. And to be quite honest, I’m responsible for the fact that we’ve grown so far apart from each other, too. I had an affair about ten years ago and, although she claims to have forgiven me, our life together has never been the same since. The trouble was,” he added slowly, meeting Alex’s eye, “I told her that it was over when it wasn’t. So of course, when she found out, I had to finish it all over again. It was touch and go for a long time. It was why I took this job, actually. I decided to row for dry land, and here I am.” He smiled sardonically.

  “I see,” said Alex.

  “What about you and Tom? Is he interested in what you do?”

  “Not as much as I’d hoped. He’s more bound up in his social work than I ever thought he would be. I’d always hoped that we would do something together – in fact, I had thought that the work that I mentioned to you might be the start of a joint business . . . oh, you needn’t look like that. There’s no way that he would ever have agreed to it. I’ve come to realise that lately. So I guess that we will grow apart, too, in time; we have nothing much in common and I’m less interesting now that I have ceased to be one of his rescue projects.”

  “Now who’s sounding bitter?”

  “I really don’t mean to. I’m very fond of Tom. I suppose that expecting him to get too deeply involved in what I do would have been asking the impossible. What’s the time?”

  Edmund held his flashy watch face against the bulb of the storm lantern.

  “Good God, it’s almost eleven o’clock. I had no idea that we had been here so long.”

  “We must go,” said Alex, scrambling to her feet. “Tom will be getting worried. And I guess Krystyna will, too, despite what you say.”

  Edmund ignored the last comment. “I’ll go first,” he said, suddenly cautious again. He pulled open the barred door and edged out on to the ledge, swinging the lantern both ways and peering down. Alex followed him out, getting down on all fours once she had left the safety of the secret room.

  “There’s no-one down there,” said Edmund. “I’m going to go first. Follow in my footsteps exactly after I’ve got to the bottom and then if you slip I’ll be able to break your fall.”

  For a heavy man, he was surprisingly nimble. He made it down the slope in two or three giant strides and stood with arms outstretched at the bottom.

  “Come now,” he said. “Turn round, so that you’re coming down backwards. There are some small cracks and crevices in the bank that you can use as handholds and footholds – you’ll see them. There’s quite a big hole under the ledge, just where you are now. Turn round and find it first with your foot.”

  Nervously, Alex obeyed.

  “Now stretch down with your other foot – that’s it. Feel that? You can get a toehold there. And again. That’s it – well done. Now you can turn round and jump.”

  She turned and jumped almost in one action, more suddenly and forcefully than either of them had anticipated, so that inadvertently she hurled herself into his arms and pushed him backwards at the same time. He fell on his back on the towpath, and she landed on top of him. Both burst out laughing.

  “Are you all right?” she gasped.

  For answer, he took her head in his hands and kissed her. She did not draw back. He stroked her face and kissed her again.

  “Alex,” he said. “It wasn’t the drink last time, and it isn’t now. I love you. I mean it.”

  She raised her head, and looked at him.

  “I mean it. I don’t expect you to say that you love me – yet. But please give me a chance.”

  Troubled, she tried to think rapidly about what he might be proposing and what the consequences would be. Her mind flooded with contradictory emotions – her disappointment with Tom, her knowledge of Edmund’s less pleasing ways, his difficulties with people, the double infidelity that he had just confessed to and, even more, the fact that he was evidently hi
ding something from her that spelt trouble – something dishonest, illegal, dangerous, she could not tell what; or possibly nothing at all, something that he had just magnified in his own mind and over-dramatised. After this flurry of thought, she surprised herself with her reply.

  “Yes,” she said. “All right. I will.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Alex and Tom lived in a maisonette in an eighteenth-century town house in Spalding. It was a three-storey building; the ground floor was occupied by a building society. There was no front entrance, but as Edmund drove around the roundabout in the Sheep Market Alex could see that the lights were still on in the living-room.

  “Where should I drop you?” asked Edmund.

  “At the top of Chapel Lane, by the railway station,” said Alex.

  “Are you sure? It’s very dark now; and the streetlights down there are dim.”

  “It’s as near as you can get in a car,” said Alex. “I’ll be fine; if there’s anyone lurking, I can always call Tom. It looks as if he’s at home now, and not in bed.”

  “All the same, I don’t like to leave you.”

  “What do you suggest? That I ask you in for coffee?”

  “No,” said Edmund, flushing. “When shall I see you again?”

  “Call me tomorrow at the Archaeological Society and we’ll work something out,” said Alex.

  “OK, I will.”

  He had parked the car by this time. He leant across and kissed her clumsily and then, reaching out, turned her face to his and kissed her again on the lips. She responded half-heartedly before drawing away.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “It’s too risky here. Tom may come looking for me and just about everyone who lives round about knows who I am.”

  “Sorry. I didn’t think. Alex?”

  “Yes?”

  “I did mean it, you know. I love you.”

  She nodded and got out of the car, trying to smooth down her trench-coat as she did so. She hadn’t looked in a mirror since they’d left the pub, but she guessed that she was pretty dishevelled. She slammed the car door, giving Edmund a cursory wave, and headed into the blackness of Chapel Lane. Edmund was right – it was scarily dark and she was rarely, if ever, out on her own at this time. She increased her pace, at the same time trying to walk as quietly as possible. She looked over her shoulder a couple of times, but no-one was following her and, even though the street lamps were inadequate, she could see that the alleyway ahead was deserted. She gave herself a little shake; she was becoming as paranoid as Edmund.

  Alex made herself try not to think too much, but to concentrate her efforts entirely on getting to the warmth and safety of home. Her mind was jangling, however, constantly trying to say something to her, overloaded as it was with shame, with joy, with mistrust, with apprehension and also an unarticulated whisper at the back of her mind that she was playing a sham role. Part of her wished that Edmund had never made this second overture to her and she had no idea why she had responded in the way that she had. It wasn’t just the drink, yet she was as aware of his faults as ever. She knew that she had no intention of jeopardising her marriage and that Edmund would be a much more impossible person to live with than Tom. Yet part of her was unwilling to let him go – she would not do so yet, anyway. She did not delude herself that theirs could be a relationship that would last, even in a clandestine fashion. Perhaps she was just flattered by his attention. If so, she despised herself for her own shallowness. Even more unwelcome were the thoughts of Tom that kept intruding. She kept on telling herself that she was not prepared to risk losing him, even though she knew that she was tempting fate in the most blatant way. She pushed all these thoughts away as she neared home.

  Number 24a Chapel Lane was about halfway along the alley. As she approached the tall blue gate that led into the yard that the Tarrants shared with the building society, she paused to fumble in her bag for her keys. There were two keys: a rather heavy silver Chubb key for the gate and a Yale for the lock upstairs. She kept them in an inner pocket in her handbag; since both the handbag and its lining were black, in the poor light she could not see properly to unfasten the zip. She fished around and found the leather tab on which they hung, pulling on it hard so that the keys jerked out of her hand and into the open gutter that ran down the side of the alley. As she stooped to pick them up, something landed beside them in the rainwater that was streaming down the gutter. There was a flash of red, then a sizzling sound. Alex straightened up and jumped back in one movement, at first startled, then terrified. She looked around her. She could see no-one; but there was the distinct smell of cigarette smoke in the air. She tried to peer into the black recesses of the doorway of the Wesleyan chapel that gave the passage its name, but she could see nothing. She bent again and scrabbled for the keys, snatched them from the gutter and hastened the last few steps to the yard door, fumbling in her panic as she unlocked the door and scrambled through it. Once on the other side, she locked it again quickly, leaning back on it momentarily to catch her breath. The switch to the outside light was set in the wall right beside the door but she dared not turn it on. She knew the stone staircase that led to the maisonette well enough, anyway, and hurtled up the steps, not pausing until she reached the flat area at the top. At the same moment, someone snapped on the kitchen light and opened the kitchen door.

  “Alex?”

  “Tom!”

  She flung herself into his arms so that he stepped back into the kitchen with the force of her weight; then, breaking away from him, she quickly banged the door shut, turned the key in it and slid the bolt.

  “Whatever is the matter? And why are you so late? My God,” he added, taking a closer look at her, “has someone attacked you?”

  “No,” she said. “I thought I heard someone in Chapel Lane, that was all. It was too dark to see.”

  “Why are you so . . . dishevelled? Your clothes are covered in mud.”

  “I had supper with Edmund and he took me to see a . . . an archaeological site that he’s interested in. But it started to rain and we both got wet; and I stumbled over at one stage.” The words came tumbling out, disingenuous half-truths.

  “I see.” Tom paused. Alex did not look at him. “And Edmund brought you home, did he?”

  “Yes. I told you that I would ask him.”

  “You did indeed. But I didn’t expect you to come back in this state. Whatever was he thinking of, taking you round archaeological sites in the rain, dressed like that? And I suppose it was dark when you went, too?”

  “Yes. But, Tom, it was my fault that I went. I agreed to it. I’m a grown woman, after all. Edmund didn’t coerce me in any way.”

  Tom looked at her curiously.

  “I should hope not. But he could at least have walked you to the door when he brought you home.”

  “He offered. I told him not to.”

  “You should have called me, then. I’ve been trying to call you for the last hour. Is your mobile switched off?”

  “I think it is,” said Alex, as if she couldn’t remember. “I turned it off for the museum meeting and I don’t remember switching it back on again.”

  Tom laughed shortly.

  “You talk about me being absent-minded. Try and remember another time, will you? I’ve been worried about you.”

  He unbuttoned her coat as if she were a child.

  “Let’s get you out of this muddy coat. Take your shoes off as well – there are some thick socks here. Put them on to warm up your feet and I’ll fetch you a fleece. Are you up for a drink? There’s so much that I want to tell you about what happened today.”

  Alex nodded and allowed herself to be petted and gently bullied. Normally she would have been furious that Tom had already forgotten her tale of someone lurking in the alleyway or discounted it as a figment of her imagination, and depressed that he was not more curious about her own day
. As it was, the less he enquired about how she had spent the twelve or so hours since she had last seen him, the better. She put on the socks and the fleece like a dutiful schoolgirl.

  “Go through into the living-room,” said Tom, pouring whiskies. “I’ve lit the fire. I decided it was not too late to do it, even though it was after ten when I got in, because I hoped that you’d feel up to talking.” Tom’s earnest face was alight with enthusiasm and importance. “You’re going to be absolutely fascinated by this. It is the most amazing thing that has happened to me in all the years that I’ve been working.”

  Alex sighed inwardly. She was not certain, but she thought that she had heard this from Tom on at least one previous occasion.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Alex and Tom were sitting together on the sofa in front of the open fire in their living room, each nursing a substantial whisky. Alex’s head was beginning to pound from the vodka and rum that she had drunk earlier, but she sipped at the whisky anyway. She had curled her legs up on to the seat of the sofa and Tom was absently-mindedly stroking them. It should have been comforting, but she wanted him to stop; she knew that she had already compromised their intimacy.

  Tom moved his hand to stroke her cheek and she flinched slightly.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked. “You don’t mind staying up to talk to me, do you? If you’re too tired, we’ll go to bed now. It’s just that my head’s buzzing with what’s happened. I know I won’t sleep if I don’t talk about it.”

  “No, I’m fine,” Alex said, trying to conceal her weariness. “You’ve made me curious now. Do carry on.”

  “Well, I’m sure you’ve heard me talk about the Padgett family?”

  Alex nodded. Tom’s casebook was seldom without an open file on one or other of the Padgett children. They belonged to a large West Indian family that lived in a sprawling but dilapidated rented house in Little London. The council paid for it, because they did not have a council house big enough to accommodate all of the Padgetts. Mrs Padgett occasionally took on some seasonal work at the neighbouring farms, but apart from that the family had no acknowledged income except what they received from the DHSS. There were ten or eleven Padgett children, all of them of school age, and most, it was reputed, with different fathers, all of whom were distinguished by their absence. Certainly there had been no man present in the household since Tom had first been introduced to it half a decade ago and sporadic attempts made by the Child Support Agency to strong-arm maintenance for some of the children never got off the ground. All of the children were too young to work, though the teenaged ones rarely attended either school or college. Mrs Padgett – who was an engaging lady, handsome in a big-boned way, with an infectious laugh – had been prosecuted for their non-attendance several times and had even been threatened with prison, but, as she said, who would look after a family like hers if she were ‘put away’? She actually cared for the children very well: they did not go hungry and were always clean and well-dressed. She blamed LeRoy Padgett, her oldest son, for getting in with the wrong crowd and acting as a bad influence on his siblings. LeRoy himself was quite a prepossessing character. He was always sunny and cheerful when he was found out. He had a series of convictions for minor crimes: shoplifting, taking a bicycle without the owner’s consent, under-age drinking.