Laughing and promising to do precisely what she had told them, Tom and Ray left for the garden centre. The ground was too wet for digging and she looked around to decide on the best way to spend her morning. She had intended to deal with the pond but, as that had been taken from her, she went behind the shed and continued to clear the abandoned rubbish of years.
The wood she unearthed was rotten and crawling with beetles and she found a small toad, asleep and looking dead which she carefully re-covered. Amid a pile of pots and broken pottery, she found an old sink, which she dragged and pushed and finally placed on the path near the back door. A small herb garden? Or alpines? Or some wallflowers for their scent? She left a note with suggestions for Tom and Ray to consider.
Looking down at her clothes she was horrified at how muddy she had become. Unfortunately as she had been expecting to visit the garden centre and deal with a clean plastic pond-liner, she had dressed more tidily than usual and the clothes she was wearing were ruined.
To add to her annoyance, directed solely at herself, she took off her filthy coat only to find that the car wouldn’t start. The motor whined and did nothing more. She waited and tried again but eventually she put on her muddy coat and set off to walk, after adding to the note she had left for Tom and Ray.
She went home via the lanes wherever possible, dreading meeting someone and convinced that if she did, it would be the immaculate Cynthia in her spotlessly clean car. It wasn’t Cynthia whom she bumped into at the end of the road when she was almost home and safe from embarrassment, it was Sophie Hopkins.
Sophie too was far from immaculate. Her dress was creased and stained, her hair was in desperate need of attention and her make-up was ill—applied. She looked unwashed, as though she had just got out of bed and Meriel thought it likely that she had. Boasting that ‘easy-going’ was an accurate description of herself, Sophie had never been one to care too much what others thought, and it was quite likely she had just popped out without preparing herself for the day, to collect some milk — a bottle of which she held in her hand. All of which made it more irritating that the woman could see her like this and criticize her.
‘Been on another mudlark have we? If you’re trying to get Evan’s sympathy you’re wasting your time. He won’t fall for that old trick!’
‘Trick? What a devious mind you have,’ Meriel smiled. ‘A sign you’re lacking in confidence would you say?’
‘Hardly! I’m the one he chose to live with, after years of putting up with you.’
Meriel walked past her and, when she got to the gate, realized that Sophie had followed her. ‘Did you want something? Is there something else of mine you want to take?’
‘Didn’t you like the watch he bought for you? He offered it to me first,’ she lied. ‘But I don’t like old-fashioned, second- hand rubbish. So he offered it to you.’
Meriel said sweetly, ‘Watch? What watch? He didn’t give me a watch, perhaps it was for someone else entirely?’ Satisfied she had returned as good as she had received she went in. Placing the post unexamined on to the hall table, she stripped off and soaked in a deep bath scented with a generous helping of one of her more luxurious Christmas gifts.
When she looked at the post there were several for Evan. Why hadn’t he arranged for the post to be redirected like everyone else? she muttered. She picked up a pen and started to readdress them but stopped. The dogs needed a walk and she had no reason not to drop them through Evan and Sophie’s letter box. She was surely past the stage of trying to avoid them?
It was not yet three but darkness was hovering on the horizon, obliterating the distant coastline. Soon it would be spreading its cloak across the sea, and the blinking of two or three lights from small boats would be visible like fallen stars. A few of the houses she passed were lit but all still had their curtains open, unwilling to see the short day ended.
The curtains in Sophie and Evan’s lounge were closed. She wondered unkindly whether they had been closed all day. Opening the curtains was always the first thing she did, a matter of pride, if she were honest. Specially if she was a bit late rising, she hastily opened them as if afraid people would think she was lazy. What a stupid way to behave, as though anyone else cared! But she still felt a little smug to think Sophie had still not opened hers. More evidence that she had got out of bed very late and gone straight out for milk.
The dogs were soon sniffing around in the back garden as she approached from the cliff path. As she approached the door with the pile of letters ready to push through the letter- box, she heard the sound of quarrelling.
‘If you won’t take me out I’ll go on my own,’ she heard Sophie shout. This was followed by low and indecipherable words, obviously Evan. She pushed the letters through and was about to walk away when she heard Sophie scream her name.
‘Meriel, Meriel, Meriel! That’s all I hear, Meriel wouldn’t do this, Meriel didn’t need to enjoy herself. If Meriel was so perfect what are you doing here, with me? And what about that watch? Who did you really buy it for? Planning another change of residence, are you? Someone younger than me?’
Meriel ran down the path, deeply ashamed of both her eavesdropping and of the doubt she had placed in Sophie’s mind.
* * *
Churchill’s Garden was quiet when Meriel walked in the following morning. Assistants were busy rearranging the various shops. They were dismantling the seasonal displays that had become drab and shabby once the celebrations were over. The muddle of the Christmas aftermath, followed by the usual sales, had left the place looking far from its usual orderliness. There was a low murmur of conversation from behind the net curtains of the hairdressing salon, and the few customers in the cafe were whispering, as though subdued by the sober activities. Of the usual group of friends, only Cath was there, sitting in her usual table.
‘Are you ready for another coffee, Cath?’ Meriel asked after depositing her shopping to claim the table.
Cath stood up and moved to the larger table and handed Meriel a piece of paper. ‘These are the dates and venues of all the sales for January,’ she said. ‘Not many, and some of these are miles away. It’s always quiet after Christmas.’ When their coffee was in front of them they studied the list and decided which of the events they would attend.
Vivienne was the next to arrive. ‘My Toby is with Helen and Reggie,’ she said, glaring at Cath as though expecting her to ask.
Cath smiled and said, ‘I’m sure Helen enjoys that. She misses her children, no matter how bravely she copes without them.’
Mollified, Vivienne turned to Meriel. ‘Your Evan’s new woman is a lively one! You should have seen her the night before last. Star of the dance floor she was. Drunk enough to abandon all her inhibitions and just sober enough to stay upright. I went to a new club in town and she was there with another woman and they picked up a couple of lads. Having fun they were, was it a celebration? A birthday?’
‘How on earth would I know? And he isn’t my Evan!’ Meriel said firmly. ‘He lives with Sophie and I don’t care what she gets up to.’
‘Got up to plenty she did, mind.’ Vivienne said, taking a bite of a cream doughnut. ‘I don’t think she went home at all.’
Remembering the untidy appearance of Sophie when she saw her the previous morning, walking up the road carrying a bottle of milk, Meriel was confused. Her emotions twisting and weaving so it was impossible to analyze her feelings. She felt slight sympathy for Evan, then spiteful satisfaction that burned inside her. There was also bitterness and, although she tried to ignore it, a tiny tinge of hope.
‘Would you go back to him if he and Sophie separated?’ Vivienne asked watching Meriel’s face and the cavalcade of thoughts flitting across it.
There was a lack of certainty in Meriel’s, ‘No.’
On the beach with the dogs later that day Meriel was surprised to see Christian, Ken and Evan. She walked on, having decided to ignore him.
‘Don’t tell me you’ve got time to stroll along the beach
in the afternoon,’ she teased Christian.
‘He’s looking for that cave I and my friends used to dare each other to go into as kids,’ Evan told her.
‘Rupert and Oliver came home covered in mud one day and I suspect they’re doing the same as Evan did,’ Christian explained with a grin. ‘Even though they promised not to.’
‘I don’t think it’s as deep as it used to be,’ Meriel said. ‘The dogs sometimes go in there but the opening seems to stop a few yards in. The stream that ran through the middle became a torrent for a while but it’s nothing more than a trickle now.’
‘Perhaps I was wrong then. They must have been somewhere else.’
‘The dogs get muddy here sometimes.’ Meriel explained. ‘I think the bank above is sodden after the wet autumn we’ve had and the soil is being washed into the sea.’
‘The boys did say they were muddy once after a swim.’
‘And you didn’t believe them,’ Ken teased. ‘Sign of a misspent youth when you suspect your kids of doing forbidden things!’
Christian looked up at the bank of earth above the rocks. ‘I think you’re right, Meriel, the soil is slipping after the rain.’
* * *
Joanne had a visitor that afternoon. She hadn’t appeared at the cafe that morning and no one had seen her for a few days, so Cynthia, on the way back from one of her charity lunches, parked in her drive and walked to the front door. The door was open and to her surprise she saw Joanne on her knees, polishing the stripped oak floor in the hall.
‘Oh dear, don’t tell me your cleaning lady’s let you down again?’
‘Why are they so unreliable?’ a flustered Joanne said, as she got up and disposed of dusters and polish. ‘It’s Fifi, she loves to play in the garden and the ground is so wet. So as I had to wipe it up, I decided to polish it as well, just to remind myself I still can,’ she tilted her head towards the kitchen, her face flushed from her exertions. ‘Coffee? Decaffeinated of course.’
‘Of course.’ Cynthia guessed from this occasion and several others that Joanne did her cleaning herself. What she couldn’t understand was why she lied about it. Meriel did her own, and so did a number of her friends. She had done so herself for years and had never found it in any way shaming. So why the secrecy? And more seriously, what else was she finding it necessary to lie about?
She drank the coffee and complimented Joanne on her delicious cake.
‘I’ll give you the recipe if you like?’ Joanne offered. While she was finding it, and copying it out, Cynthia went to the bathroom to replenish her make-up, leaving her bag lying on the couch.
Seeing the bag was open, with her wallet so temptingly on show, it was seconds only for Joanne to open it and remove two ten pound notes and replace the wallet exactly as she had found it.
Eight
The five boys still went out secretly at night whenever the weather and circumstances allowed. With winter making the prospect less attractive, Joanne’s boys would sometimes wait in vain for the call to let them know the Sewell boys were there.
With growing confidence, they began to go out on their own. If Rupert explained that they were unable to get out, Jeremy and Justin waited until they were certain their mother was asleep, and took the car for a few turns around the lanes. They didn’t go far and they were never tempted to drive fast.
Justin was now tall enough to reach the pedals and see enough through the windscreen to avoid trouble but he only took over when they were in a place safe from being observed. They learned that the gates of the sports club were broken and one night they went in and drove around the field, leaving tyre marks to mystify the groundsman. They practiced manoeuvring the car around corners, both forward and in reverse and they would creep back to bed unable to sleep after the excitement, coming down for breakfast bleary-eyed and weary.
Joanne gave up checking the mileage on her car during the cold, dark weeks following Christmas. There were no other incidents to make her suspicious on the occasions that she did check and gradually her curiosity faded. The boys settled down to their school work and apart from occasional arguments about the amount of time spent on home projects, and constant requests for extra money from John, life had no serious problems.
She did take the boys to the doctors to ask if there was a physical reason for their unusual tiredness, but the doctor found nothing wrong.
Before she had married, Joanne had worked as an assistant cook. She was not fully qualified but she had real flair for sugar-work. She began to specialize in desserts and, as a side—line, she had on occasions decorated wedding and other celebration cakes. In recent years she did this very skilled work only rarely for friends but she still enjoyed it, so when John asked if she would make a wedding cake for one of his colleagues she was pleased.
‘It’s a man who supplies me with bacon and sausages and all that, at a very reasonable rate,’ he told Joanne. ‘Divorced he is and marrying a woman who worked for me for a time, in the OK Cafe I sold a month ago.’
The wedding was arranged for Easter and Joanne rang the prospective bride and made an arrangement to meet to discuss what was required. The result of the initial phone call was to promise to make the desserts and the starters as well as the cake and Joanne was quite excited.
‘I’ve been idle so long, what with having the boys and being involved in their upbringing, now this request to do the cake and the rest, well, it’s made me suddenly realize that I have time for myself at last,’ she told Cynthia and Meriel and Vivienne one morning when they met in Churchill’s Garden. ‘I’m going to meet her later this morning to discuss the style of cake she requires and I’ve bought a few magazines to help her decide.’
‘I’m so pleased,’ Cynthia said. ‘You’re very talented and it’s a sin to waste a talent, isn’t it, Meriel?’
‘Yes. I’ve wasted mine, such as it is, for too long.’ She smiled at Joanne saying innocently, ‘Some extra money for you too and we can all do with that.‘
‘There’s that too,’ Joanne said as though it wasn’t important. ‘I’ve no idea what to charge!’
They decided to visit the local bakery and get a few prices and phone others in town before Joanne left for her appointment. The result cheered her enormously. If she could develop a reputation for this, she would soon have her finances under control.
An hour later she stood near the counter in Boots cafe looking around for the woman who was to marry Carl Davies, John’s colleague. A young girl stood near by and they exchanged comments about friends who were late, before realizing that they were in fact waiting for each other.
‘I’m Dolly Richard. I didn’t realize you were John’s wife.’ Dolly said. ‘I expected someone — er — different. Long hair and…’ she thought ‘younger’ but decided it was wiser not to say so.
Joanne smiled. She couldn’t admit that on seeing this girl who could hardly be older than seventeen, she too had been expecting someone, er, different! Carl was John’s age, at least forty!
Disapproval faded as she talked to the girl, who was obviously very much in love with Carl. What she began to feel was sympathy. What was this young woman thinking of, tying herself to a man more than twice her age? Then came the second shock.
‘It’s so kind of you to make the cake for me and do the desserts and starters. I haven’t any parents see, and I can’t afford anything very grand. If it wasn’t for your offer to do this as a wedding gift, I would probably have to make do with a Marks and Spencer’s celebration cake,’ she said.
‘Isn’t Carl paying for your wedding?’ she asked, her spirits sinking. ‘I mean, in the circumstances he’s better able to afford it than you.’
‘It’s the divorce you see. His wife has been very bitter, and she’s taken so much, that Carl hasn’t recovered. Unless we do everything on the cheap, we’d have to wait years and,’ she blushed prettily, lowering her eyes, ‘Now, with the baby an’ all…’
Joanne waited for John that evening, her fury making it impossible
to sit still. She opened the front door the moment his car stopped and demanded, ‘What are you thinking of, telling this Carl Davies that I’d do his wedding cake for nothing? And the starters and the gateaux! I don’t care how you get out of it, but I’m not doing it! You refuse to give me the money to buy the boys what they need for school and yet offer to pay - with money we can ill afford and with my efforts — for this man’s wedding to that poor innocent child. It’s not on.’
John walked past her into the house and turned angrily.
‘Don’t shout out my business for all the world to hear! If you have to act like a shrew at least wait until I’ve closed the door!’
The two boys stood at the kitchen door, curious to know what had happened to make their mother so angry. She had been walking up and down like a caged tiger ever since they had come home from school and had snapped at them for no reason.
‘Go to your rooms.’ John said.
‘No! Stay and listen to this. You aren’t children. You’re old enough to understand why I am angry.’
‘Your rooms,’ John said threateningly, and they hung around the newel post unable to decide who it was most politic to obey. John gave a growl that made them shoot up the stairs, but at the top they stopped and leaned over the banister rail, hoping to hear enough to understand what had happened.
‘D’you think it’s another woman?’ Justin whispered.
‘It won’t be another man, she’s too old,’ Jeremy replied sadly. ‘Pity mind, I wouldn’t mind a stepfather, your real dad spoils you rotten then.’
‘John,’ they heard their mother say, ‘I would willingly make this wedding cake, even though I think it’s an embarrassment to be associated with such a travesty. I would make the cake and do what I could to make that poor child’s day as successful as possible. But I won’t do it as a favour.’
Friends and Secrets Page 13