‘There, you see?’ Maddie said happily. ‘And now it is settled. Are you ready to paint yet, Granddad?’
‘Maddie, hang on a second,’ Rose said, going to help her father down the last two steps. ‘Dad, should you even be up?’
‘I feel fine,’ John said. ‘I told you, all I needed was a rest and my medication.’
‘You don’t look fine, though,’ Rose said, examining John’s greyish and waxy skin.
‘I’m fine,’ he said, brushing her helping hand away. ‘I heard you two talking down here. It was a nice sound. I would like to live with you, Rose. Not to be my nurse or take care of me. I will be on my feet for a good while longer yet, and when … if I’m not I’ll sort out care.’ John looked at her, taking a breath as he obviously needed to gather some courage to say the words he’d clearly prepared. ‘I would like you to live here because you are my little girl. And I’ve missed you all these years. Because I’m selfish and weak and the older I get, the more I would like the chance for redemption.’
‘And because you like me,’ Maddie reminded him, keen not to be left out.
‘And because I like you very much,’ John told the child fondly.
‘Live here?’ Rose looked around the tiny cramped room. ‘But what about Tilda?’
‘Tilda is important to me,’ John said. ‘More than I am able to say. But our friendship is what it is. I can’t ever mend what I took from her: the chance to be happy, have children, grandchildren. I don’t want to lose her, so I’d have to ask you to find a way to accept her, maybe even befriend her one day.’
Rose ran her fingers over her face. This felt so soon, so sudden. Wasn’t it only last week that her father was all but ignoring her? Could things really change so quickly, in the blink of an eye? There was so much to consider, to worry about, if it didn’t work out. Not least, uprooting Maddie again just as she got settled into a new home, but worse, the hurt that both of them would feel if in the end John couldn’t live with and care for them in the way he hoped to. Rose wasn’t strong enough to stand another rejection, not from her father, not again.
And then she remembered how her mother went out one morning and never came back, how Richard walked into the café one day and took over her life, how she had cut away her old hair and dyed it blonde, how she had let a man she barely knew kiss every single inch of her. This was what life was like, hanging on a thread, balanced on a knife edge. Life was a precarious existence full of uncertainty, and it was only her marriage to Richard that had kept her from understanding that until now.
‘OK,’ Rose said, much to Maddie’s delight. ‘Perhaps we could move in over the weekend? On a trial basis, see how it goes? But yes, yes, Dad. Yes, we would love to live here with you.’
‘Good,’ John smiled, sinking rather abruptly onto a chair, causing both Maddie and Rose to rush to his side. ‘Oh, for God’s sake, stop clucking around me like I’m an invalid. Keep this rubbish up and I will change my mind.’
* * *
‘You’re going to live here with your old man?’ Shona said, looking up at the outside of Storm Cottage. ‘Has it got an inside loo?’
Shona had stopped by on her way home to say a proper goodbye after Rose had called her to tell her their plans. It was getting late, close to eleven, but still the sky was awash with light, even though the moon had risen and the stars had begun to pierce through.
‘I’m going to try,’ Rose said cautiously. ‘Who would have thought it? I came here with some half-cocked plan to get Frasier, and I found my father, a home, friends. A place where Maddie feels like she belongs. It really couldn’t be much better, could it? Do you think this could be it, Shona? Do you think this is our time to be happy?’
‘I do,’ Shona said. ‘I think it’s our time to be happy for both of us. Not just you, but me too. I really feel that, Rose, I really do.’
The two women hugged each other for a long time, Rose reluctant to let go of her friend.
‘Jenny’s going to be put out when you tell her,’ Shona said, rolling her eyes. ‘For a minute this afternoon it looked like she had another punter. This bloke turned up, reckoned he was a rambler, although if he was, the only place he’d ever rambled to was the pub. But anyway, he had a look around, decided he didn’t like it and was on his way. When you move out she’ll have no guests again.’
‘There’s got to be something I can do to help her,’ Rose said. ‘She’s scary, but she’s been nice to me.’
‘Help her figure out how to make money out of that annexe, that would be a start,’ Shona said. She nodded at the car. ‘I’d better be on my way.’
‘Drive carefully,’ Rose said. ‘Stop if you get tired. Don’t drink and drive.’
‘Because I might spill it,’ Shona giggled. ‘As if I ever would. Who are you, my mother? Oh, no, that’s the angry woman stranded at home with my kids. See you, babe.’
‘See you,’ Rose said. She stood in the yard until the light of the little Nissan finally disappeared into the advancing gloom. Now it was time to start to live her new life for real, no more rehearsals. This was it.
Chapter Fourteen
‘WILL I NEED a passport?’ Maddie said as she and Rose set off in Frasier’s car early the next morning. Goodness only knew what time he’d got up to pick them up, but he’d arrived at eight on the dot on Friday morning, concerned to hear that John had had a funny turn.
‘Do I need to call the specialist?’ he’d asked John almost as soon as he’d walked in through the door of Storm Cottage, pulling out a chair and sitting next to him. John regarded him sideways with a distinctly disdainful air; he was definitely feeling better.
‘It’s just the old trouble,’ John said carefully. ‘The damn arthritis, the pills, the withdrawal if I forget to take them. I’m fine now. Rose stayed here with me last night, and tomorrow they are going to come and stay here perhaps for good, if I’m lucky.’
‘Really?’ Frasier beamed at Rose. ‘That’s wonderful news. Someone to answer the phone at last!’
‘I shan’t be turning the phone on,’ John said drily, raising a menacing brow. ‘So where are you taking my daughter today, and why?’
‘Oh! Er … just thought I’d take her to look at the gallery, have a day trip, see some of your work in situ, you know,’ Frasier had said, shifting a little uncomfortably in his chair, like a teenage boy having met his girlfriend’s angry father for the first time. ‘You’re more than welcome to come along. It’s just when I’ve asked before –’
‘I’d rather gouge my eyes out with a rusty nail than go anywhere near that den of commercialism,’ John said, pursing his lips in what might have been a gesture of disapproval or a repressed smile, Rose wasn’t sure.
‘We don’t have to go,’ Rose stepped in. ‘Not if you’re not up to being alone?’
‘I am perfectly capable of being alone,’ John said. ‘In fact, I shall enjoy it, a little period of calm before my life changes for ever. And besides, Tilda said she’d pop in to see how I am.’
Rose noticed how Frasier’s eyes had widened, and he glanced at her, no doubt to gauge her reaction to the news that Tilda was still a part of her father’s life. So he had known about her all along too. What other secrets did her father have that Frasier was keeping for him? The truth was that Rose hadn’t really had much time to think about it. She’d spent the previous night squashed into the single bed in the boxroom with Maddie, in case John wanted her in the night. Encircled in her arms, Maddie had drifted off to sleep at once, but Rose wasn’t sure that she slept at all for any of the night, as everything that had happened circled round and round in her head. Tilda, her father’s wife, still his friend, and what else? It was hard to tell from their brief meeting, and Rose supposed that if she’d never met Tilda before, had no idea who she was, she would just have seen a kind, concerned older woman when she opened the front door to Storm Cottage, and not the home wrecker she had always believed Tilda to be.
That was part of it, Rose had thought, part of coming
to terms with what had happened and finding a way to love her father again. Accepting that he too was as much, if not more, responsible for what had happened to Rose and her mother as anyone, including Marian and even Rose herself. Realising that he was as flawed, if not more so, than any other human being. Wouldn’t Maddie have to do the same to love her father again, one day soon? And when the time came, Rose would have to steel herself to help her do it. There wasn’t any alternative.
‘Just bear in mind that you are not to touch my daughter in any way I do not deem appropriate,’ John had said, this time a definite smile twitching around his mouth.
‘Never, ever, I would never …’ Frasier had said, a little disappointingly, until he realised that John was joking and broke out into a smile. ‘Without Rose’s say so.’
Rose had grinned all the way to the car.
‘You won’t need a passport,’ Frasier told Maddie. ‘Not yet, anyway. Maybe in a couple of years’ time you Sassenachs will find it harder to get across the border, but today you should be OK.’
‘What’s a Sassenach?’ Maddie asked him.
‘It’s a sort of rude word that Scottish people use to describe English people,’ Frasier said, winking at Rose, who was repressing a smile as she looked out of the window.
‘Well, that’s not very polite, is it, Mum?’ Maddie said, huffing. ‘Not very polite at all.’
There was a moment or two of awkward silence. And then Frasier piped up, ‘So anyone for a game of I-spy?’
Poor Frasier McCleod, he’d lived his whole life long without ever before playing a game of I-spy with Rose’s daughter. Little did he know it was going to be a long, long journey.
It took almost two hours before Frasier finally pulled up alongside McCleod’s Fine Arts, which, as Rose peered out of the window, seemed to take up all four storeys of an impressive-looking Regency grey stone house on Queen Street, opposite ornamental gardens enclosed with decorative wrought-iron railings, and in the middle of an elegant-looking terrace. Coming round the car, Frasier opened the door and helped Rose out, then lifted Maddie down onto the pavement.
‘It looks foreign,’ Maddie said, staring up at the building with interest. ‘How far away is the Loch Ness Monster? Will I need to speak Scottish to understand anyone? Will they try and arrest me for being a sassa-thingy?’
‘How about we start off with some tea and cake?’ Frasier said, taking Maddie’s hand and leading her into the gallery. ‘And no, no one will try and arrest you, I promise. I must say, young Maddie, I have never played such an expert and intricately complicated game of I-spy before.’
‘I’m not an expert,’ Maddie said proudly, clearly thinking that was exactly what she was. ‘I just like to describe things accurately, which does mean that sometimes I do have to use a lot of initials.’
‘I would never, ever have got that the blueish, greenish, tinted with pink thing was C for cloud, one that we last saw about fifty miles ago!’ Frasier said with remarkable goodwill, considering that Maddie had spent most of the journey testing him to his limit. Rose smiled; it was nice that Maddie had another adult to call her friend. Her next task must be to find her someone of her own age who would understand her.
‘That was because you weren’t concentrating properly,’ Maddie said, content to leave her hand in his as he led them into the gallery. ‘I did keep telling you to!’
Behind the reception desk a pretty, red-haired young girl beamed at Frasier, coming round the desk to greet Maddie and Rose. For one horrible moment Rose thought that this charming young creature, in the full flush of beautiful youth, might be Cecily, but it turned out her name was Tamar and she was an art student who worked here part time, to help fund her studies. It was clear she had an enormous crush on Frasier, by the way she fluttered her lashes at him, and giggled when he asked her to arrange some tea and cake, but happily Frasier was completely oblivious to her admiration. He probably had eyes only for Cecily, Rose thought.
‘Come and look at some art,’ Frasier said after dispatching Tamar. ‘Maddie, I want you to tell me what you think of my latest acquisitions, which ones will make me money and which I will be reluctantly returning to the artist.’
Rose and Frasier hung back as Maddie walked around the large room, which must have once been about four if not five separate rooms, but which Frasier explained he’d gone to great trouble and expense to open out into his main showing area, with a few smaller rooms leading off it.
‘It’s really very impressive,’ Rose said in hushed tones, feeling that for some reason she ought to be whispering. ‘Did you have all of this when you came to see me in Broadstairs?’
‘Good Lord, no,’ Frasier shook his head. ‘I barely had two pennies to rub together when I came to see you. Not that I would have wanted you to know that. I was very keen to impress you. I knew you wouldn’t want to talk to just any old two-bit chancer – which I wasn’t, by the way. I was just … starting out on my own after years of working for other people.’
Rose stopped as Maddie stood nose to canvas with a painting that seemed to her to depict mainly a large purple blob, and yet her daughter seemed fascinated by it, examining it minutely.
‘You certainly did make an impression on me,’ Rose said, glancing at him shyly. ‘More than you will ever know, really.’
‘Me? Really?’ Frasier replied softly. ‘And to think for all those years since, all I’ve been doing is thinking how crass and rude you must have thought me, turning up like that out of the blue, dragging up all sorts of terrible memories for you, and all so I could chase down a painting and make some money.’ He turned to look at her and, sensing his gaze on her cheek, Rose met his eyes. ‘There was so much I wanted to say, to do that day. There was something about you that was so … compelling. You’ll laugh, Rose, you’ll think I’m foolish, but you’ll never know how hard it was for me to just leave you there. I didn’t want to. I barely knew you, and yet … Oh, well, there are only so many times a man can regret a thing. Can regret not saying or …’
He stopped himself, dropping his gaze from Rose, who on impulse reached out and took his fingertips in her hand.
‘What you don’t know,’ she told him in a barely audible whisper, suddenly spurred on by the look in his eye, the timbre in his voice, and the need to tell him the truth, ‘is that those few minutes you spent with me on that day have kept me going ever since. Frasier, the only thing that’s kept me going all these years, through the hell of my marriage, was thinking about you and the way you looked and spoke to me that day. Every time I thought about you I became a little stronger and the reason I –’
‘Darling, there you are!’ Frasier tugged his fingers abruptly from Rose’s hand and turned to greet a tall, slender, perfectly put-together natural blonde, who was striding across the gallery towards them in a pair of pressed white linen trousers and a lacy white camisole top that left little to the imagination. She had a great body, though, Rose had to grudgingly concede, one that positively begged to be shown off.
‘Cecily, what a surprise!’ Frasier said, going to greet her, and seeming a little caught off guard when she kissed him full on the lips. ‘I didn’t expect to see you today. I thought you had that thing –’
‘The PR networking lunch, you mean,’ Cecily said, beaming at Rose and Maddie in turn. ‘I do have that, but as you were showered and gone before I got up this morning, and I missed you, I thought I’d pop in and say hello before I have to spend hours pretending to care what other much less interesting people than me have to say!’ Cecily winked at Maddie, who smiled at her.
‘Everyone I know is less interesting than me,’ Maddie said eagerly, as if she’d just met a soul mate.
‘It’s a terrible bore, isn’t it?’ Cecily said, smiling warmly at Maddie. ‘So, my darling, are you going to introduce me to your guests?’
She turned to Frasier, the questioning look in her eyes enough to let Rose know that Frasier hadn’t told Cecily anything about them.
‘Of course. Th
is is Rose Jacobs,’ Frasier said, introducing Rose formally. Cecily took her hand and shook it once, with firm confidence. ‘John Jacobs’ daughter. She is staying with her father and wanted to see the gallery. Well, as John contributes about sixty per cent of our annual turnover, I thought it was only right that I obliged.’
‘Rose!’ Cecily said warmly, taking Rose by surprise by hugging her as if embracing a long-lost friend. ‘How nice to meet you at last. I’ve often wondered what it must be like to be the child of a great genius, which your father undoubtedly is. I think in many ways it must be as much a creative struggle for you to be his daughter as it is for him to be an artist.’
Rose blinked. ‘Um, I don’t know really. We haven’t spoken to each other in about twenty years.’
‘Oh, of course,’ Cecily said, dismayed. ‘I can be so crass. I’m so good at putting my foot in it, I sometimes think I need to employ my own PR company. I hope things work out, for both of you. I know I’m an old romantic, but I’m always hopeful of a happy ending.’
‘Me too,’ Rose said, utterly dismayed that Cecily, whilst being a little over the top and inappropriately dressed, seemed to be a very nice, decent, not to mention beautiful, woman.
‘One day,’ Cecily said, putting her arms about Frasier’s waist and holding him close, ‘we will both get our happy endings, I’m sure. I’d like to know what your dad is like when he’s happy. He scared me to death!’
‘You’ve met my dad?’ Rose asked her, intrigued.
‘Well, once. Fraiser took me with him once. He made a great show of pretending to loathe me!’ Cecily’s laugh tinkled like shattering glass. ‘Who am I kidding? He really didn’t like me at all.’
Dearest Rose Page 28