Coming Home

by Fern Britton

  ‘When you’re done with her,’ Ella lifted her hands and began to draw in the air, ‘I want you to paint a huge canvas of a darkly rolling sea with stars twinkling and a lighthouse flashing across the waves. It’ll be perfect above the fireplace.’

  ‘One day,’ he put his glass down and kissed her knee, ‘that’s exactly what I shall paint for you.’

  Ella’s hand was around his shoulders as he lay his head in her lap. The candlelight flickered warmly creating a cosy cocoon. ‘This is nice,’ she said sleepily.

  ‘We won’t be able to do this tomorrow. Your brother will be here and Adam will be back.’

  ‘Oh yes.’

  ‘And the day after, you might find out what happened to your mum.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What do you think happened to her?

  ‘A million things. I have spent my whole life thinking about her and why she left. Sometimes I want her to come back and other times I hope she’s dead. It would be easier. I could build a picture of a mum I want. Not a phantom built from questions.’

  Ella wondered if what she had said last night was true. She felt no anger towards her missing mother. Just a need to know why. She took the dirty plates and glasses from last night and stacked them into the dishwasher before putting the kettle on for a pot of morning tea. As she waited for it to boil, she tidied the rest of the sitting room, plumping cushions, opening the curtains to the early sun and picking up a chewed slipper and a rubber chicken, both toys left by Celia and Terry.

  She heard both dogs yawning from their room next to the kitchen and went to let them out. Terry came out, then sat scratching like any human man under his armpits and Celia strode out as if she was wearing thigh-high boots.

  ‘Good morning,’ said Ella.

  The Afghan hounds ignored her and, pushing through her legs towards the kitchen door, took themselves into the garden.

  Leaving the back door open, knowing there were no escape routes from the garden, she took a tray of tea up to Kit.

  He was propped up against his pillows, waiting for her.

  ‘And how is the mistress of the house today?’

  Ella gave a little bob of a curtsey, and as she put the tray down and went to climb into bed, the phone rang.

  ‘Leave it,’ said Kit.

  Ella picked it up. ‘Hello? Henry, where are you? Okay. Lovely. Can’t wait to see you.’ She smiled at a scowling Kit. ‘And Kit can’t wait, either! Bye. Love you.’

  Kit watched her as she put the phone down. ‘I suppose this means I’m not going to see your ankles, Ruby?’

  She grinned at him. ‘There’s always time for ankles, m’lord.’

  ‘Ow!’ Ella squeaked, putting the hot baking tray down quickly.

  Kit, coming downstairs freshly shaved and smelling delicious, popped his head into the kitchen. ‘You okay?’

  ‘The tea towel was a bit thin and I burnt myself on the pasty tin.’ She ran her fingers under the cold tap. ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘They smell good,’ said Kit checking his watch. ‘Anything I can do?’

  She looked at him over her shoulder. ‘I just want you and my brother to get on well. It would mean so much to me.’

  She looked so anxious, cheeks pink from cooking, hair caught up in a bun with a pencil allowing curls to escape over her ears, and her singed fingers under the tap. Kit got a clean tea towel and went to her. ‘Here, let me dry your hand.’ He turned the tap off and gently wrapped her hand, kissing the tips of her fingers as he did so. ‘Of course I’ll like your brother. But will he like me?’

  Ella began to laugh. ‘Well, he will if you take him to the pub!’

  ‘I think I can manage that.’

  The rattle of a taxi in the drive heralded Henry’s arrival.

  ‘He’s here!’ Ella ran to the front door and opened it. ‘Henry!’ She charged out of the house and ran at him, smothering him in a hug and kisses. ‘I’ve missed my bro.’

  ‘Whoa, let me pay the driver,’ he said, disentangling himself as best he could.

  As he got his bag from the back seat and handed the driver his fare, he saw a man he assumed must be Kit. He gave him a quick scan. Thirtyish. Checked shirt and shorts. Nice tan. Looked okay.

  He put his bag into his left hand and extended his right. ‘You must be Kit. Henry.’

  ‘Henry. Good to meet you.’ It was Kit’s turn to run a discerning assessment of Henry.

  Long legs. Expensive jeans and jacket. White open-necked shirt. Flash watch. But he looked okay.

  Ella looped her arms through each of the boys’ and dragged them into the house. ‘Welcome to Marguerite Cottage.’

  Inside the hall, Henry dropped his bag on the flagstones and looked around him. ‘Very nice, Ell’s Bell’s.’

  ‘Come into the garden. Tea? Coffee? I could make a jug of Pimm’s?’

  Henry followed her through the lounge with Kit, and out through the double doors into the pretty garden. ‘You have landed with your bum in butter, haven’t you, Ellie? Very nice.’

  ‘Yes, I have.’ Ella replied, squeezing her shoulders to her ears and grinning in delight. ‘And I’ve got pasties for you. Homemade.’

  ‘Fancy a pint?’ asked Kit.

  ‘Do I?’ Henry smiled. ‘With an offer like that, if Ella doesn’t marry you, I will.’

  Ella was mortified and dug Henry in the ribs. ‘Shut up.’

  ‘Just saying,’ he said, clutching his side. ‘Will the pasties keep for an hour?’

  ‘Yes. Go on. They’ll keep. I’ll take your bag up to your room. You’re in Kit’s studio. For now.’

  ‘I’ll take it up later. It’s heavy.’ He opened it and hauled a bulging carrier bag out. ‘Here, take this bag – it’s got a huge pile of post for you. When you left me in London I didn’t think you’d be falling in love and not coming back.’

  Ella couldn’t keep a blush from her cheeks. ‘God, you are so embarrassing.’

  Kit saved her. ‘Neither of us expected to fall in love, but we did. I love your sister very much.’

  Henry half closed his eyes and weighed up this open declaration. ‘Good on you. Don’t muck her about or I’ll flatten you.’

  ‘Fair enough.’ Kit smiled. ‘Now, how about that pint? Ella, do you want to come?”

  ‘No thanks. You two go and get to know each other. I’ll make myself a Pimm’s and have a look through the post Henry’s brought.’

  She waved the boys off with their promise to be only an hour, or so, and took the Waitrose bag of post to the garden.

  Getting a glass of Pimm’s, she settled herself at the garden table and sifted through the mail.

  The piles in front of her grew tediously. Catalogues. Charity requests. Bank statements. A postcard from an old school friend now living in Peru. Pension firms. Insurance firms. Funeral savings plan. And, a letter from a publisher. Months before she had written and illustrated a children’s book called Hedgerow Adventures. She had hoped that her departed granny would guide her to a fruitful contract. She opened the envelope.

  Dear Miss Tallon,

  Re Hedgerow Adventures

  Thank you for your submission. Unfortunately this is not the sort of book we would publish. We will return the manuscript under separate cover,

  Yours etc …

  She sat back and blew out a long breath of frustration.

  ‘Granny,’ she said, ‘you got me excited for a moment. Ah well. C’est la vie.’ She picked up her Pimm’s and took a long, cool, self-commiserating mouthful.

  Her phone buzzed. It was Henry.

  ‘Hi, Henry, is everything okay?’

  ‘Have you looked at your emails?’

  ‘No, I’ve been going through the post. So much crap …’

  ‘Check them now,’ he said urgently.

  ‘Okay, hang on.’ She put her phone on speaker and looked at the screen. There was an email waiting to be opened. ‘I’ve got it. It’s from Granny’s solicitor.’

  ‘Open it.’

  She
did so and as she read it her heartbeat began to accelerate ‘Oh. My. God,’ she whispered. ‘It can’t be true.’

  ‘It is true.’ Henry’s voice was gruff with anger.

  Ella’s hand was shaking as she gripped the phone. Swallowing hard to stop any tears she said, ‘Our mother is alive?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Henry. ‘And she wants to see us.’ He was having difficulty keeping the shock from his voice. As soon as he had read the message, relaxing with a pint on the Dolphin’s oak bar and chatting to Kit, he’d excused himself and gone to the relative privacy of the pub car park to phone Ella.

  He was scuffing the gravel with his shoes. ‘I can’t believe she’s got the nerve.’ He bit his lip, his face the definition of rage and pain. ‘After all these years.’ He pushed his free hand into his floppy fringe and pulled his hair. ‘She’s bloody alive. Well, I can tell you now, we are not seeing her.’

  Ella sat down. ‘But she’s our mother.’

  ‘Ha! She lost the right to call herself that years ago.’

  ‘Henry, this is shock talking, we need time to think about it.’

  ‘No, we don’t. There’s only one reason she’d come back. Because Granny’s solicitor has told her that Granny is dead and that she is in for an inheritance. That’s all there is to it.’

  Ella loved her brother very much, but she didn’t always agree with him. ‘It must have been a shock for her to hear that. Her mother dead, her father too.’

  Henry snorted and ran his hands through his floppy blond hair. ‘Well, it was a bit of a shock for me too, you know, when I heard that my mum had run away. I was only two.’

  ‘I know.’ Ella looked at the garden she and Kit had started to plant. ‘I can’t imagine how she could leave you. She knew you. It was easier for me. I was just a baby. She didn’t have time to know me. I don’t have a clue what she was like … and that’s why I’d like to see her.’

  Henry sat on the wall of the pub’s entrance, all the adrenalin leaving him. ‘I don’t know what to think. I was hoping they wouldn’t find her. Or if they did, that she had died.’

  ‘Don’t say that!’ Ella flopped into her squashy sofa. ‘Is Kit still with you?’

  ‘He’s inside. I saw the email and came out to tell you first. He doesn’t know.’

  ‘Come home. The pair of you. Come home now.’

  Ella had been hugging herself with joy just ten minutes ago. How quickly everything can change for the worse.

  Ella took Henry’s bag up to Kit’s small studio and put it next to the single bed. It was getting on for late afternoon and through the open window a blackbird was singing in the magnolia tree. Instantly anger rose in her. How dare the bloody birds be so happy while her world was turned upside down? She shut the window with a bang, making the bird fly off. Good riddance, she thought to herself.

  Downstairs she heard Kit’s car pull up. She ran down and opened the front door.

  Kit was looking serious, as if there had been a terrible accident and he now had the responsibility of the fallout. Which he had, she supposed.

  Henry was pale and blowing out his cheeks in a childhood mannerism that always signalled upset.

  ‘Hi,’ she said softly.

  Kit came to her immediately and put his arms around her. He felt the softness and sweetness of her incredible red curls then stood arm’s length from her, his hands on her shoulders. ‘You okay?’

  She shook her head and at last felt hot tears springing to her eyes. ‘Not really.’

  Kit shepherded brother and sister into the kitchen and made them sit down. ‘You both need a drink. Tea or alcohol?’

  Ella settled for a cup of tea while Henry and Kit had large gin and tonics.

  ‘Right,’ said Kit, pulling out a chair from the table and sitting down. ‘Tell me exactly what has happened.’

  Ella looked at Henry. ‘Do you want to tell him?’ she asked.

  Henry shrugged in reply and looked at his hands clenching the icy glass.

  She looked at Kit. ‘The solicitor has found our mother and she wants to see us.’

  Kit was looking at her attentively. ‘What do you think she wants after all this time?’

  ‘Granny’s money,’ said Henry, flatly.

  ‘Or,’ said Kit trying to sound positive, ‘she might be coming because she wants to see you two, after all she hasn’t seen you for …’

  ‘Almost twenty-five years.’ Henry picked up his glass and drank.

  Ella swallowed hard. ‘The thing is, Henry has memories of her. Nice ones, I think.’

  Henry grunted.

  ‘They had had time to get to know each other. It was much more painful for him.’ She looked at her brother. ‘I should think.’

  Henry said nothing but looked at the floor.

  ‘Whereas I don’t remember anything about her. I mean she left when I was only just over a year old,’ said Ella, still watching Henry. ‘That’s why I want to see her.’

  Henry glared at her. ‘Really?’

  Ella twiddled her fingers anxiously. ‘I want to know what she looks like. Do we look alike? What she’s been doing? Why did she leave us?’ She wiped her nose as a tear ran down her cheek. ‘Everything, really.’

  Henry was angry. ‘She’s one selfish cow who doesn’t deserve to be listened to. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s lied through her teeth anyway. She might not even be our mother. Just some strange woman who thinks she could get lucky. I wouldn’t believe a word she said.’

  ‘But, Henry, we must try. Then decide whether we want to be friends or not.’

  ‘Friends? What are you talking about? She’s a madwoman. We don’t know anything about her. Correction, we know that she had two children by the time she was seventeen and she never told her own parents who the father – or fathers – were, and despite Granny and Grandad being kind and supportive to her, she ran away in the night and never looked back. What kind of person does that?’

  ‘A sad person?’ Ella said quietly. ‘A person who finds themselves in a really hard place at the start of their adult life and can’t cope. People run away all the time. Every day. She was not in her right mind.’

  ‘Why didn’t she come back?’ demanded Henry.

  ‘She was scared,’ Ella said. ‘Once you’ve done something like that, maybe there is no coming back.’

  Henry gave a short laugh. ‘Really? Not to have any curiosity about how your children turned out? Not even to see your own parents? Who, in case you had forgotten, never recovered from the worry of what might have happened to her?’

  Ella drained her cup of tea, gripped by a sudden anger at his unkindness. She scraped her chair back and took her cup to the sink. She kept her back to her brother. ‘Have you no empathy?’ There was a tea bag in the sink. She fished it out and put it into the food bin. ‘She was just a young girl, Henry. One who had got herself in a mess and she wanted to change that.’

  ‘By walking out and leaving her shit to be cleared up by her parents?’ sneered Henry. ‘Brilliant.’

  Kit, who had been listening to all this quietly, now intervened. ‘You two getting angry with each other isn’t going to help.’

  ‘Oh, shut up. You know nothing about it,’ said Henry, waving his hand dismissively.

  ‘I know Ella,’ Kit replied calmly, ‘and I agree with her. You both need to meet this woman and find out who she really is. If you don’t like her after that, then fine. It’s over. You can all move on.’

  Ella softened and, walking to Henry’s chair, put her arms around his neck and hugged him. ‘Kit’s right.’

  Henry clasped his sister’s hands and pulled her closer to him. ‘It hurts …’ He spoke quietly.

  ‘I know,’ she said.

  ‘Was it me?’ His voice caught. ‘Was it my fault?’

  Ella took her arms from his neck and knelt by his side. ‘How could it be your fault. You were only two. It might have been my fault. I was the final straw. A second mistake.’

  Henry’s tears began to fall. He a
ngrily wiped them away. ‘I hate her, Ellie. I don’t want to see her and I don’t want you to see her either.’ He took her upturned face in his hands. ‘Promise me you won’t see her? I couldn’t bear it.’

  Ella saw the pain in her brother’s eyes and made her decision. ‘I promise I won’t see her for as long as you don’t want me too. But I can’t promise that I’ll never want to see her.’

  He nodded and let his hands drop. ‘Thank you,’ he answered simply.

  2

  Agra, India, 2018

  Sennen was nervous. More than nervous. What was going on in Cornwall? Her solicitor had promised to phone as soon as he had heard back from Ella and Henry and she’d been restless all morning. She walked to the shuttered windows of her hotel room and looked down on to the bustle of the street market. She could almost feel the heat and smell the dust through the glass. It was monsoon season, and although the clouds had now cleared, the last downpour had left deep puddles on the muddy street and in the awnings of the market stalls. She watched as a young woman in a rose-pink sari stepped out into the busy road and neatly sidestepped a couple of hungry dogs who took a sniff at her shopping, a plastic bag filled with colourful vegetables and herbs. A passing tuk-tuk beeped his horn and she waved at the driver in recognition, rows of golden bangles slipping up her arm and glinting in the hot sun.

  Sennen watched as the woman continued her journey until she was no longer in view. How jealous she was of that woman.

  She began pacing her hotel room once again.

  What had she done?. She twisted her wedding ring and stared at the phone by the bed, willing it to ring.

  The letter that had started this turmoil was next to the phone.

  A letter postmarked Cornwall.

  Cornwall. She’d walked away a long time ago. She thought of a quote from The Go-Between: ‘The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.’ Who wrote that? If Kafir were here he would know. Kafir … one of the most erudite men she knew. Not that she knew many men. Her life hadn’t all been roses, and right now it was just the thorns.