by Fiona Walker
‘The festival is one of the few profitable income streams. The family has precious little involvement in the practical running of it these days, as you know. It’s all handled by the team on site, but Poppy has ultimate autonomy. The financial side doesn’t interest her; she loves such clever people coming into her orbit for a few days annually, although she gets into a panic about the event itself, worse and worse each year. With Dad staging his ridiculous rebellion this year, I think he might have truly pushed her over the edge.’
‘But she loves the festival. She wouldn’t want to cancel it.’
‘It was always Dad’s baby, remember? Sure, she took it over just like she took over the house, cramming it full of sculpture, performance poetry and installations. It used to be just music and literature at one time, Dad’s real loves, but Poppy saw an opportunity to showcase her own work and naturally got her way, putting all her cronies onto the board.’ There was great bitterness in his voice. ‘Now that she has been proven the worst sculptress in the stratosphere, she keeps looking for an excuse to ditch the Arts in favour of an international celebration of food.’
‘But she hates food!’
‘Don’t assume that just because she doesn’t eat it, she doesn’t crave it. Rather like surrounding herself by art she admires even though she can’t create it.’
They had reached the first of the gravestones in the outer reaches of the churchyard, tucked behind yet more yews that shielded the plot traditionally allocated to the estate from that of the rest of the dearly departed congregation. To the left of the yews in a prettily railed enclosure stood the grandest stones and a small mausoleum belonging to the Waite family who had owned Farcombe Hall for several hundred years until they were forced out when death duties practically bankrupted them in the seventies. The estate had then passed through several developers who made unsuccessful attempts to fashion it into a luxury hotel and golf resort, before being bought by Hector at the height of his success as a private holiday home for his family.
Francis rested his hip against a tombstone’s lichen crust, blond hair flopping as he bowed his head, still the self-conscious epic hero he’d fashioned himself into as a student. ‘We can’t let her do this, Legs; not if Gordon Lapis wants to come here. There’s too much riding on it, and Poppy certainly won’t get Dad back by cancelling the one thing that could save Farcombe.’ He steepled his fingers to his nose for a long time before admitting, ‘We have a rather large financial shortfall on our hands this year. Dad’s been trying to play it down, of course, and now he’s run away and buried his head in the sand completely. Poppy has no idea how serious it is, nor the limited number of options we face if the festival doesn’t go ahead.’
‘What are the options?’
‘We’ll have no option but to asset-strip – land, art, possibly even the house itself.’ He eyed her face closely for a reaction. ‘There’s already one offer on the table.’
‘You can’t sell Farcombe!’
He stared down at the tombstone. ‘Vin Keiller-Myles has been trying to get his hands on this place for years.’
‘Isn’t he the dodgy impresario? Always arguing with your father about which performers to invite?’
Back in the Fitzroy Club days, Vin Keiller-Myles had always been one of last men standing – and musicians playing – who would join club owner Hector in sinking bottles of bourbon late into the night, alternately jamming, imbibing, brokering deals and above all gambling. Both men had been high-stakes players when it came to laying bets and doing business. Hector had been one of the earliest investors in Vin’s mail-order music company, VKM, at a time when few believed it would work. Not many years later, Vin repaid his due and fulfilled a lifetime’s ambition by buying the Fitzroy Club for himself. Since Farcombe Festival’s inception, Vin had been one of its foremost patrons.
Vin liked to collect modern sculpture to fill his echoing and bright mock-Deco holiday house perched on the cliffs just across the Cornish border, rivalling nearby GCHQ Bude for its vast, weird whiteness. He was to date the largest – and only genuine – collector of Poppy’s work. In return, Poppy booked many of his avant-garde musical friends to perform during festival week, his taste these days being no less eclectic than in his rock and roll youth, often involving ageing white-haired men in black suits and dark glasses playing one note repeatedly on vast stacks of electronic instruments connected to computers. He and Hector maintained a joshing public friendship and private rivalry that verged on extreme enmity.
‘Vin wants to buy out the festival as well as the estate,’ Francis looked up at her through his lashes, ‘but Dad’s always told him he’ll only get it an artwork at a time, starting with Poppy’s blobs. He’d rather torch the place than see Vin playing lord of the manor here.’
‘I thought they were old business allies?’
He shook his head. ‘Old gamblers are never friends, not when they’ve lost so much to each other over the years. There’s a well-known rumour that Vin won the Fitzroy Club in a bet. The same rumour says that Dad seduced his girlfriend by way of revenge, then fell in love and married her.’
‘Your mother?’
He nodded. ‘She was Vin’s childhood sweetheart, and Dad stole her off him. It’s all supposedly forgiven and forgotten now, but you never get over something like that, do you?’ His blue eyes seared into hers, making her look away.
She’d never heard him mention the fact before, although he could have buried it in a quote.
They walked past the yews to the mausoleum.
‘I often wish my mother had been buried here.’ Francis stopped by the rails and gazed at the pretty building, a neoclassical mini-temple cast in local stone, inset with carved marble plaques featuring doves and angels. ‘Then I’d be able to visit her grave whenever I like.’
Legs’ heart gave a lurch of pity as it always did when she thought about beautiful Ella Protheroe losing her life so young and leaving her son without a mother, her heartbroken husband with an empty castle and no queen.
According to Francis, whose concept of beauty had changed over the years, Ella had looked variously like Raquel Welch, Elizabeth Siddal, Nicole Kidman and an Egon Schiele’s model Valerie Neuzil. Almost all photographs of his mother had been destroyed by Hector’s jealous second wife, Inés. But Ella had undoubtedly been a great beauty, and she had loved Farcombe, although illness had made her a rare visitor and she had spent the final years of her short life in New York. The Big Apple had also been the setting for Hector’s ill-fated rebound marriage, an unhappy union which Francis sometimes ruefully pointed out lasted half as long as his mother’s illness, but brought no less pain or respite. It was only when Hector had returned to Farcombe that he’d found reprieve and eventually love … or so Legs had always believed, however much Francis had tried to cast Poppy as the evil stepmother when he was a boy.
‘Do you really want Poppy and your father back together?’ she asked him now, almost without thinking.
‘Of course. They are husband and wife.’ He held onto the rails of the Waite plot, fingers drumming on the black cast iron.
‘That’s so reactionary!’
‘Farcombe Hall is the backbone of the local community; we are all its custodians. We have a duty.’
Legs had never heard him speak like this. ‘Not so long ago, you wanted her gone with all your heart.’
‘I’ve grown up a lot in the past year,’ he said, turning away.
She felt the barb dig into her skin.
‘Of course; you’ve moved on, met Kizzy,’ she said, nodding. He must be grateful to Poppy for bringing them together, at least.
‘Ah yes, Kizzy.’ He let out a deep, thoughtful sigh which Legs frantically sought to interpret. Was it a loving exhalation or exasperation?
‘She’s stunning.’
‘Isn’t she?’ he said through tight lips.
‘And very “dutiful” I’m sure,’ she sniped and then regretted it as he fell silent.
As they wandered around
gravestones, Legs felt torn between guilt, jealousy and fury. Reaching the far wall that bordered the village lane, they lent against an ornate stone memorial shaped like an eagle spreading its wings over a vast book.
Francis cleared his throat. ‘You won’t tell anyone what I’ve just said about the financial situation here will you?’
‘Of course not.’ Legs shook her head. By ‘anyone’, she felt sure he meant Conrad. Then, unable to stop herself, she asked: ‘Does Kizzy know?’
‘No,’ he said tersely. ‘She already holds enough Protheroe secrets, believe me.’
‘You make her sound like keeper of the family closet.’
‘We all have confidences we choose not to share. She has hers and I have mine.’
‘I guess that’s what’s meant by a balanced relationship,’ she said carefully.
He turned to face her, blue eyes softening. ‘She still doesn’t know we’ve kissed for a start.’
‘We were once engaged, Francis, I think she’ll have taken it as read that we—’
‘I meant yesterday.’ He stepped closer, the warm whisper of his breath joining the sun on her face.
Legs had to turn her head away to stop thinking about kissing him, reminding herself that Conrad trusted her, even if she didn’t quite trust herself at the moment. ‘I hadn’t met Kizzy yesterday.’
He snorted irritably.
‘What are you not telling me?’ she demanded.
The lichen was now being scraped at a furious rate. ‘I guess it’s more what about what you’re not saying, Legs.’
‘Meaning?’
‘I thought Farcombe meant something to you, that you cared about my family, our history, even if you’ve moved on from loving me.’
‘Of course I care! What’s happening between our parents is devastating.’
‘Which is why we must unite forces.’ He nodded earnestly, sounding like a world leader discussing a Middle Eastern crisis.
‘We can’t pretend to be something we’re not.’
His voice deepened as he moved closer again: ‘You heard Poppy’s threat.’
‘So? Let her cancel the festival. This is about our families, not Farcombe’s cashflow or my career. Gordon can stay a recluse for ever for all I care. Frankly, I think he’d be happier that way. He’s too volatile for fame; it’s living a lie.’
‘And he’s not living one already? We all do that, Legs.’ Two blue eyes danced between hers. ‘If we said what we really thought, we’d never survive.’
‘Try it, Francis,’ she breathed, their lips ridiculously close now. ‘Just this once, tell me what you really feel?’ She searched his handsome face for clues, willing him to admit that there was nothing staged or make-believe about the way they were both feeling right now. As teenagers they’d played Truth or Dare; as adults they no longer dared to tell the truth. That conspiracy of silence had given the lie to their relationship a year ago.
He ran his tongue across his teeth, blue eyes gazing up at the statue’s broken-beaked face.
‘Say it,’ she urged. ‘What do you want most of all right now, this minute?’ She tried not to pucker up as her lips tingled with anticipation.
His hand found hers and gripped it tight, fingers shaking with emotion: ‘I want Gordon Lapis at Farcombe Festival!’
Legs froze. ‘What?’
He looked petulant. ‘Well, you did ask.’
She carefully unthreaded her fingers. ‘And if I stop that happening?’
Keeping hold of her ring finger, he lifted it to his lips and kissed its bare skin ‘“… if thou wilt needs marry, marry a fool; for wise men know well enough what monsters you make of them”.’ As so often in the past, Francis could not personalise his feelings; his words belonged to other people, loaded with emotions he couldn’t express any other way.
With a polite nod, he turned and walked away, leaving Legs feeling utterly demoralised.
She looked up at the stone eagle, noticing that somebody had graffitied To Kill a Mockingbird on its stone book. She had a nervous feeling it might have been her and Daisy, high on alcopops on Millennium New Year’s Eve.
Chapter 10
A call to Conrad from the village telephone box hardly lifted her spirits. He’d stayed up late the previous night composing a press release, he announced happily, and was poised to notify the eager media and millions of ardent Lapis fans that the author would reveal his identity at Farcombe Festival. Now sitting in the stands at Lords watching the England India test match with his kids, he was as brief and to the point as always.
‘As soon as this goes live, Farcombe will be a sell out. No time to lose. Don’t let me down, Legs.’
‘Don’t send it yet!’ she insisted. ‘It’s very far from confirmed.’
The call left her riddled with self-doubt; her heart and head at odds. Her feelings for Francis, boxed up for so long, were now bouncing around all over the place on rusty springs, whereas Conrad remained neatly filed under ‘macho’ in a locked cabinet in London. What’s more, she was feeling increasingly uneasy about Gordon Lapis’s decision to make Farcombe his main stage. Even assuming Poppy didn’t pull the plug on the festival out of sheer spite, and that the committee could be convinced of the financial benefits, Gordon himself was such an unknown quantity, he could easily change his mind. If he did, that would completely ruin Farcombe, and it would be all her fault.
She trailed down past the harbour to Fargoe beach and splashed through the sea, freezing her ankles and wondering how she might cope with losing her job, lover and family security in one weekend.
She couldn’t be totally sure as she struggled to see through the maelstrom of memory and melancholy, but she was starting to suspect that she had never stopped loving Francis. She was frightened of the told-you-so clichés that were pulling and pushing her right now, trying to trip her up like the waves underfoot. In the past year, distance had made her heart grow fonder in direct proportion to familiarity breeding contempt with Conrad. Now she was back in Farcombe, nostalgia was flooding her head as fast as the incoming tide.
Children with buckets and spades, inflatables and boogie boards raced in and out of the waves around her as she trudged all the way to the rocky outcrop at Hartcombe Point and looked back across the sand to the village. The sea was racing in, forcing the holiday-makers back in its wake, sandcastles toppling, windbreaks and towels being whipped up, creams teas and ice creams sought out. She remembered the ritual so well, along with the long summers of Swallows and Amazons freedom that had lent her familiarity with everything around her.
Except nothing felt familiar any more, not even her own heart.
Given this opportunity to reclaim Francis and appease the guilt, surely she should grasp it? She was vacillating madly between the unexpected force of her attraction to him and the dreadful messiness of the situation. She longed for her childhood again, for those carefree holidays where the most important things in the world were winning at rounders, building secret camps and creeping out for midnight ghost hunts in the woods after the adults had gone to bed.
Now the adults were all in the wrong beds, and she had inadvertently led the way.
She needed somewhere to stay, and knowing that a second night in the Honda would leave her walking like Quasimodo, she headed back towards the harbour to stop off at the Book Inn.
The ‘Private Function’ sign had been turned around to offer ‘Food All Day, Cream Teas and Award-Winning Accommodation’. The girl on the desk – an unfamiliar face, but with a familiar nervous voice from the previous day’s phone call – told her that it was fully booked, flashing a jaunty tongue stud as she spoke, which gave her a lisp. Legs went into the bar where Guy was serving, looking very grey beneath his blond-tipped hair.
‘Allegra North! You are Alka Seltzer to my hangover!’ He kissed her delightedly, bloodshot grey eyes disappearing into weathered laughter creases. ‘We were beginning to think we’d never see you in Farcombe again. My, but you look good – I’ve missed this beauti
ful face.’ He cupped her cheeks fondly.
Built like a stocky prop forward with a jutting jaw and a permanent frown born from too many sunny days sea-angling and long nights cooking in the kitchen, Guy cut an intimidating figure, but he possessed the gentlest of souls.
‘You should have come in yesterday,’ he wailed when she explained that she’d arrived the day before and U-turned at the A-sign. ‘We had a big party for Nonny’s fortieth. You’d have been a wonderful birthday surprise.’
Nonny and Guy were the classic Beauty and Beast couple, her balletic grace and charm counterpoised by his craggy, workaholic passion. Originally from west London, they’d run a small chain of foodie wine bars in the profitable W-postcodes from Kensington to Notting Hill, Marylebone to Little Venice, many of them frequented by Legs, Francis and their gang. It was Legs who had told them about Farcombe, and the then Harbour Inn, which was hideously run down at the time and about to be flogged by a failing brewery. Seeing an opportunity at a time when they were ripe for change, they had bought it sight unseen and moved their entire family to the coast. They were followed by many of their London friends and clients, who visited on such a regular basis that some had even bought second homes in the area. The couple had made a huge difference to the village’s year-round popularity. Having once worked as a music promoter, Nonny was incredibly well connected which, matched with Guy’s legendary cooking skills, guaranteed the Book Inn a high level of occupancy. Always busy, it was positively heaving in high summer and guaranteed to be booked out six months in advance for festival week. At this time of year, it rarely ever had a room free at the weekends.