The Storm Sister

by Lucinda Riley

  ‘It used to be, but . . . I have to plan for our future now.’

  ‘Of course you do. Motherhood is changing you already.’

  And as I settled into bed that night, I thought how Thom was right. I wasn’t just thinking of me anymore, but what was best for my little one. There was no doubt I was happy here, secure and peaceful in this country I was beginning to love. And the fact I had been denied my true heritage made it somehow more important that my child be allowed to embrace theirs. We would do it together.

  The next morning, I told Thom that, in principle, I thought it was a wonderful idea and that I’d love to stay and have the baby here.

  ‘I’ll also see if I can get Theo’s Sunseeker yacht sailed over here. Even if I can’t ever pluck up the courage to get back aboard myself, maybe you’d like to take your nephew around the fjords of Norway for me in the summers.’

  ‘Great idea,’ agreed Thom. ‘Although for the baby’s sake, Ally, if not yours, you are going to have to get back on the water at some point.’

  ‘I know, but it’s not for now,’ I said brusquely. ‘The only thing that worries me is what I would do after I’ve played interior designer and given birth.’ I put the pancakes he loved on the table for breakfast.

  ‘See? You’re doing it again, Ally, projecting into the future.’

  ‘Shut up, Thom. You’re looking at a woman who’s worked all her life, had a challenge every day.’

  ‘And you don’t think that moving to a new country and having a baby is enough of one?’

  ‘Of course it is, for now. But even though I’ll be a mother, I’ll have to do something else too.’

  ‘I could probably throw you a bone,’ Thom said casually.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘There’s always a place in the orchestra for a flautist as talented as you. As a matter of fact, I was going to suggest something to you.’

  ‘Oh, and what was that?’

  ‘You already know about the Grieg Centenary Concert, the one which is meant to include The Hero Concerto, but probably won’t now. The first half includes the Peer Gynt Suite and I was thinking how very apt it would be to have a real-life Halvorsen play the opening bars of ‘Morning Mood’. In fact, I’ve already mentioned it to David Stewart, and he thinks it’s a wonderful idea. What do you think?’

  ‘You’ve already spoken to him?’

  ‘Ally, of course I have. It was a no-brainer and—’

  ‘Even if I’m rubbish, my name will get me the gig,’ I finished for him.

  ‘Now you’re just being deliberately obtuse! He heard you play with Willem at the Logen Theatre, remember? What I’m trying to say is that you never know where that night may lead. So I really wouldn’t worry too much about finding a job if you do decide to put down permanent roots here.’

  My eyes narrowed as I glared at him. ‘You’ve got it all worked out, haven’t you?’

  ‘Yes, I have. Just like you would have done too.’

  Exactly three weeks to the day after I had taken the concerto to Felix, I knocked on his front door with trepidation. There was no answer for a while and I began to suspect that even though it was almost noon, Felix was still sleeping off a hangover.

  And when he arrived at the door, bleary-eyed and in a T-shirt and a pair of boxer shorts, my heart sank.

  ‘Hi, Ally. Come in.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  The living room smelt of stale alcohol and tobacco, and my tension grew as I saw the empty whisky bottles lined up like skittles on the coffee table.

  ‘Sorry about the mess. Sit down,’ he said, gathering up a tatty blanket and pillow from the sofa. ‘I’m afraid I’ve slept where I’ve fallen for the past few weeks.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Drink?’

  ‘No thanks. You do know why I’m here, don’t you?’

  ‘Vaguely,’ he said, running a hand through his thinning hair. ‘Something to do with the concerto?’

  ‘That’s right, yes. Well?’ I said briskly, now desperate to know if he’d risen to the challenge.

  ‘Yes . . . Now, where did I put it?’

  There were piles of sheet music stacked all over the place, many other sheets crumpled into balls which had been there on my last visit and were now collecting dust and cobwebs where they’d been thrown. I watched miserably as he hunted through bookshelves, overflowing drawers and behind the sofa where I sat.

  ‘I know I put it somewhere for safekeeping . . .’ he muttered as he bent down to look beneath the piano. ‘Aha!’ he said in triumph as he opened the top of the gorgeous Blüthner grand piano and secured it with the wooden rod. ‘Here it is.’ He reached inside and took out a mammoth pile of sheet music. Bringing it over to me, he dumped it on my knees, which nearly collapsed under the weight of it. ‘All done.’

  I saw the first sheets were the original piano part, held in a clear plastic file. The next section was for the flute, the next for the viola and then the tympani, just as he’d described. I turned over file after file of immaculately written music, and by the time I’d got to the brass section, I’d forgotten how many instruments he’d done the orchestrations for. I looked up at him in sheer unadulterated amazement and watched him smile back at me smugly.

  ‘If you’d known me for longer, my newfound dearest daughter, you might have known that I always rise to a musical challenge. Especially one as important as this.’

  ‘But . . .’ My eyes fell on the whisky bottles on the table in front of me.

  ‘And as I vividly remember telling you, I work better drunk. Sad but true. Anyway, it’s all there, ready for you to take to my beloved son and get a verdict. Personally, I think my father and I have produced a work of genius.’

  ‘Well, I’m not qualified to judge the quality, but certainly the amount you’ve done in the time you’ve had is a miracle.’

  ‘Night and day, darling, night and day. So, off you go.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes, I want to go back to sleep. I haven’t had much since I last saw you.’

  ‘Okay,’ I said as I stood up clutching the enormous bundle to my chest.

  ‘Let me know the verdict, won’t you?’

  ‘Of course I will.’

  ‘Oh, and tell Thom from me that the only part I’m not convinced about is the horns coming in with the oboe in the third bar of the second movement. It might be a little too much. Goodbye, Ally.’

  With that, the door was closed firmly behind me.

  ‘What is that?’ Thom asked as he arrived home after an orchestra call that afternoon and noticed the piles of sheet music placed neatly on the coffee table in the sitting room.

  ‘Oh, just the completed orchestrations for The Hero Concerto,’ I said casually. ‘Cup of coffee?’

  ‘Please,’ he answered, then did a comical double-take as he realised what it was he was looking at.

  I walked calmly to the kitchen, poured the coffee and returned to the sitting room to find Thom already leafing through the pages, just as I’d done.

  ‘How? When? Who?’

  ‘Felix. In the past three weeks.’

  ‘You’re kidding me!’

  ‘No, I’m not.’ I wanted to punch the air in triumph at his astonished expression.

  ‘Well, of course,’ he said, clearing his throat so his voice came down an octave, ‘I don’t know what the quality’s like, but . . .’

  I watched as he hummed the oboe part, and the violas, then turned to the tympani and began to chuckle. ‘Brilliant! I like that a lot.’

  ‘Are you angry?’

  ‘I’ll tell you later.’ He looked at me then and I saw the exhilaration and true respect in his eyes. ‘But at first glance, Felix has done an incredible job. Forget the coffee, I’m calling David Stewart to catch him before he leaves. I’ll take it down to him now. I’m sure he’ll be as astounded as we are.’

  As I helped him gather the music together, and waved him out of the door, wishing him good luck, I felt exhilarated.
/>   ‘Pip,’ I whispered as I looked up at the stars from the front door. ‘Your “Hero” is finally going to get her premiere.’

  As the autumn ticked by and plans for the performance of the concerto – complete with Felix’s inspired orchestrations – gathered momentum, I was kept busy with plans of my own. I’d contacted Georg Hoffman and explained the situation. He’d agreed that it sounded like a sensible idea to put a roof that I partly owned over my and my baby’s heads. I’d added my meagre savings and Theo’s small bequest to the pot and then I’d started on the renovation of Froskehuset. A vision had already taken shape in my mind of a beautiful Scandinavian retreat, with reclaimed pale pine floors and walls, furniture from young Norwegian designers and the latest in energy-saving technology.

  I’d been struggling with the fact that technically, both Thom and I should do the right thing by Felix and, at the very least, hand him a third ownership of the house when we changed the deeds to include me on them. When I’d tackled Felix on the subject of his share of Froskehuset he’d grinned at me. ‘No thanks, my darling. It’s kind of you to offer, but I’m quite happy here in my cabin and we both know exactly where the money would go anyway.’

  Also, last week, Edition Peters – known as C. F. Peters when it was Grieg’s publishing house all those years ago in Leipzig – had already enquired about The Hero Concerto and a recording was planned with the Bergen Philharmonic for the new year. As the legal heir to the performing and publishing rights of his father’s work, plus his own work on the orchestrations, there was every chance Felix stood to earn a lot of money if the concerto was as big a success as Andrew Litton believed it would be.

  With my conscience salved, and whether it was the nesting instinct or not, I felt full of optimism and energy as I interviewed local tradesmen and builders, consulted with the planning authorities, and pored over endless magazines and websites. I thought how my sisters would laugh at me, Ally, being interested in interior design. And pondered how hormones were responsible for so many of our human actions.

  As I leafed through a book of fabric samples, I realised guiltily that I hadn’t called Ma nearly as often as I should have while I’d been in Bergen. Or Celia for that matter. And now that I’d just passed the supposed ‘danger time’ of three months, both of them deserved to know the news.

  I dialled Ma in Geneva first.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Ma, it’s me, Ally.’

  ‘Chérie! How lovely to hear from you.’

  I smiled in relief as I heard the warmth and complete lack of reproach in her voice.

  ‘How are you?’ she asked.

  ‘Well, that’s quite a question as it happens,’ I said with a rueful laugh. And then, punctuated by her expressions of surprise and wonderment, I told her all about Thom and Felix and how Pa Salt’s clues had led me to them both.

  ‘So I hope you’ll understand, Ma, why I’ve decided to stay on in Bergen for a while longer,’ I said finally. ‘And there’s one more thing I haven’t told you that complicates matters slightly. I’m pregnant with Theo’s child.’

  There was a momentary silence from the other end of the line, then a delighted intake of breath. ‘But that’s the most wonderful news, Ally! I mean, after all you’ve . . . been through. When’s the baby due?’

  ‘On the fourteenth of March.’ I thought it too much information to tell her that, after the scan had confirmed an exact date, I’d worked out that the baby had been conceived on or around the day of Pa’s death.

  ‘Oh, Ally, I couldn’t be happier for you, chérie. Are you happy too?’ she asked me.

  ‘Very,’ I reassured her.

  ‘As your sisters will be too. They will be aunties and we will have a new baby visiting Atlantis. Have you told them yet?’

  ‘I haven’t, no. I wanted to tell you first. I have been in contact with Maia, Star and Tiggy in the last couple of weeks, but I can’t seem to get hold of Electra at all. She hasn’t answered my texts or emails and when I phoned her agent in Los Angeles and left a message, nobody returned my call. Is everything OK with her?’

  ‘I’m sure she’s just very busy – you know how hectic her work schedule is.’ Ma’s reply came after what I thought was a tiny pause. ‘As far as I know, she’s fine.’

  ‘Well, that’s a relief. But also, when I called Star in London, I asked to speak to CeCe, and Star just said she wasn’t there. I’ve heard nothing from either of them since.’

  ‘I see,’ said Ma noncommittally.

  ‘So do you have any idea what that’s all about?’

  ‘I’m afraid not. But again, I’m sure there’s nothing for you to worry about.’

  ‘You will let me know if you hear from them, won’t you?’

  ‘Of course, chérie. Now, tell me more about your plans for when the baby arrives.’

  After I’d eventually put down the phone to Ma, having also invited her and any of my sisters she could round up to the Grieg Centenary Concert in December, I dialled Celia’s number. Like Ma, she sounded delighted to hear from me.

  I’d already decided that I wanted to tell Celia in person about the baby, knowing what an emotional moment it would be for her. There was also the unresolved matter of Theo’s ashes.

  ‘Celia, I’m afraid I haven’t got long to talk now, but I wondered if you’d mind if I flew over to see you in the next few days?’

  ‘Ally, you don’t need to ask. You’re welcome here any time. I’d adore to see you.’

  ‘Perhaps we could go to Lymington, to . . .’ I couldn’t help the catch in my voice as I said the words.

  ‘Yes, it’s time,’ she answered quietly. ‘We’ll do it together, as he would have wanted.’

  Two days later my flight landed at Heathrow, where Celia was waiting for me in the arrivals hall. As we drove out of the airport in her ancient Mini, she glanced across at me.

  ‘Ally, I hope you don’t mind, but we’re going straight to Lymington rather than Chelsea. I don’t know if I ever mentioned to you that I still have a cottage there. It’s only small, but it’s where Theo and I used to camp out in the school holidays so that we could sail together. It seemed . . . fitting somehow that we should stay there.’

  I reached across and squeezed her hand as it clutched the steering wheel tightly.

  ‘Celia, it sounds perfect.’

  And it was. The little bow-fronted cottage was nestled right in the heart of Lymington’s Georgian town centre, surrounded by cobbled streets and quaint pastel-coloured buildings. We dumped our bags in the narrow entrance hall and I followed Celia into the cosy beamed sitting room. Then she took my hands in hers.

  ‘Ally, before I show you to your room, I just want to warn you, this cottage only has two bedrooms, one is mine, the other . . . well, it’s where Theo used to sleep and obviously it still contains . . . a lot of memories.’

  ‘That’s okay, Celia,’ I assured her, as always touched by her kindness and consideration towards me.

  ‘Perhaps you’d like to take your bag upstairs? I’ll light the fire and get started on supper. I brought some bits and pieces with me so I could rustle something up for us. Unless you’d prefer to eat out?’

  ‘I’m more than happy to stay in, thanks, Celia. I’ll be straight back down to help you.’

  ‘The room’s the first door on the left at the top of the stairs,’ she called to me.

  I picked up my rucksack and climbed the stairs. At the top, I saw a low wooden door, roughly stencilled with the words ‘THEO’S CABIN’. I pushed it open and saw a narrow bed beneath the sash window, with a worn toffee-coloured teddy bear wearing a miniature fisherman’s sweater propped up against the pillows. The uneven walls were scattered with pictures of yachts, and above the painted chest of drawers hung an old-fashioned red and white striped lifebelt. Tears pricked my eyes as I registered the similarity to my own childhood room at Atlantis.

  ‘My soulmate,’ I whispered, suddenly feeling Theo’s essence all around me.

  Then I sat
down on the bed, picking up the teddy bear and clutching it to my chest, as the tears spilled down my cheeks at the full realisation that Theo would never see his own child.

  That evening, Celia and I chatted companionably as she dished up the chicken casserole. A fire was crackling in the grate of the sitting room and we settled ourselves on the faded squashy sofa to eat.

  ‘This place is so homely, Celia, I can understand why you love it here.’

  ‘I was lucky enough to inherit it from my parents. They were sailors too and it was the perfect place to bring Theo when he was growing up. Peter never really took to sailing, and anyway, he was nearly always abroad on business in those days, so Theo and I spent a great deal of time here one way and another.’

  ‘Talking of Peter, have you heard from him recently?’ I enquired gently.

  ‘Strangely enough, I have. In fact, I’d go as far as saying we’ve become quite chummy in the past few weeks. He’s been calling me regularly and there’s even talk of him coming over to stay with me in Chelsea at Christmas. As we both seem to be at a loose end.’ A faint blush rose on Celia’s delicate cheekbones. ‘I know it may sound trite, but it’s as though Theo’s death has somehow washed some of the bitterness between us away.’

  ‘It doesn’t sound trite at all. I know he hurt you terribly, Celia, but I really got the feeling that he’s seen the mistakes he made and how they hurt you.’

  ‘Well, no one is perfect, Ally. And maybe I’ve grown up too and seen some of the things I got wrong. I certainly know that when Theo was born, he was my world for years. I pushed Peter away, and as you’ve probably realised, he isn’t good at being ignored.’ She smiled.

  ‘No, I can imagine. I’m happy that you’re back on speaking terms, at least.’

  ‘I did actually tell him that you and I were coming down to spread Theo’s ashes at sunrise tomorrow morning, but I haven’t heard back from him. Typical Peter,’ Celia sighed. ‘He never was any good at communicating on the things that really mattered.