There was nobody wearing green, Lynn noted, nor were there any bad fairies present; but her mother had turned up dressed to the nines and every inch the unrepentant, erring woman doing the only thing she could do – look everyone in the eye and brazen it out. Piers was absent and their father was at sea, much to everybody’s relief. Graham’s absence was taken as a matter of course. Margaret and her boys stood protectively on one side of Nina, and Lynn and Simon on the other, until Lynn was called to the designated place for parents and godparents in the front pew.
The service was a long one. After hymns, readings and sermon the vicar led them to the baptismal font at the back of the church. There he made the sign of the cross on the baby’s forehead, parents and godparents made the promises he prompted them to make, and then he held the baby over the font, and poured water over his head.
‘I baptise thee Thomas Alexander . . .’
Anthony looked as if he would burst with pride, happier, if possible, than on his wedding day. Brenda looked radiant. Thomas Alexander began to bellow. What a pair of lungs for such a tiny boy, and not yet three months old, Lynn thought. Simon quietly put his fingers in his ears.
‘Thank goodness I’m not giving a speech,’ Alec whispered. ‘Who could compete with lungs like his?’
After the service, they stood chatting with Brenda’s parents, who had completely forgiven Anthony for being a fisherman – and seemed almost as eager to clasp him to their bosoms as they were to clasp the lusty, bawling grandson he’d exerted himself to produce for them. The disasters of six months ago seemed to have brought a general increase of sympathy and appreciation to fishermen, especially from their own families, Lynn thought – and Anthony was now on a good ship, and likely to become a skipper before much longer. Quite a passable son-in-law, all told.
Alec held Lynn’s hand as they filed out of the church, and gave it a squeeze. ‘Hope we manage to get the wedding in before the christening,’ he murmured.
Lynn looked towards her mother, and laughed. For a daughter who might soon be joining her in notoriety, she made a worthy model.
Chapter 63
The night was still warm when they drove along one-track Snuff Mill Lane under the light of a half-moon. As they approached the house the white, ghostlike form of a barn owl swooped suddenly and silently across the path of the taxi. The driver drew to a halt, and they saw Graham’s car in the drive.
‘I won’t come in,’ Alec said. ‘I’ll just drop you off, and go back. See you tomorrow?’
Lynn nodded, and got out with Simon. Inside the house, Graham was standing with his back to the living-room fireplace, and Lynn was surprised to see Lucy, sitting in an armchair.
‘Anyone for tennis?’ she asked.
Lucy looked from Graham, to Simon, to Lynn and back again, seeming a little ill at ease. A touch of conscience, maybe?
‘Go to bed, Simon,’ Graham ordered – all he had to say to a son he hadn’t seen for days.
Lynn went upstairs with him and helped him to get ready, evading his questions and preoccupied with one of her own – what the game was downstairs. A re-run of Mandy, maybe – but if Graham thought she was going to go running back to Boulevard again and let herself and Simon be barred from their own home, he had another think coming.
She laid her cards on the table as soon as she got back downstairs. ‘You can park Lucy in this house if you like, Graham, and there’s not much I can do to stop you. But I’m not leaving, this time,’ she said. ‘If anybody’s leaving, it’s going to be you. I’ll buy you out.’
‘How can you buy me out? You’ve got nothing. Where are you going to get the money from?’
‘From somebody else.’
‘Who might that be?’
‘Nobody you know.’
He gave her a penetrating look. ‘It wouldn’t be somebody called Alec McCauley, would it?’
‘Might be.’
‘Is it?’
‘It might be. What do you care, as long as you get your money?’
But she saw that he did care – like a child who has discarded an outgrown toy, and seeing it claimed by somebody else is no longer sure he had quite finished playing with it, after all.
Lucy caught that look on his face too. ‘Graham!’ she said. Her voice sounded plaintive.
He glanced at her, and turned back to Lynn. ‘I’m petitioning for divorce,’ he said. ‘On the grounds of your adultery. I’ve had a private detective tracking you.’
Lynn had to laugh at that. ‘Have you, Graham? That must have cost you a fair bit, unless you got legal aid. And what did he find out?’
‘That you’ve been having an adulterous relationship, with Alec McCauley.’
‘Where? When? Which days? What time?’ she demanded.
He couldn’t answer, and his silence convinced her that his private detective claim was sheer bluff.
The situation seemed to be weighing heavily on Lucy. In spite of her make-up, she looked drawn round the eyes and was almost squirming in her chair. Why should Graham’s top-drawer tennis partner be so uncomfortable, Lynn wondered, and looked at her a little more closely. She was wearing a light cotton dress with a plunging neckline – and was it just Lynn’s imagination, or had Lucy gone up a couple of bra sizes since that night in the Continental Restaurant?
Lucy suddenly jumped to her feet and, clamping her hand over her mouth, made a dash for the kitchen. A second later they heard the sound of retching, and then volumes of liquid splashing intermittently onto the kitchen tiles.
Lynn looked at Graham. ‘Oh! Oh, dear! Morning sickness, at eleven o’clock at night! It takes some people like that. And I thought it was a bad conscience that was making her so uncomfortable,’ she said.
While Graham was taking her home, Lynn cleaned Lucy’s stomach contents off the kitchen floor, surprised to find herself feeling very little rancour towards her rival. But then, Lucy was doing her very best to relieve her of a husband she would not be sorry to be rid of. They were working towards the same end. The only thing that rankled was Lucy’s evident determination to preserve her own immaculate, middle-class image and make Lynn the scapegoat for the whole break-up.
She was sitting in the chair Lucy had occupied when Graham returned.
‘For sheer, lying, stinking hypocrisy you take the biscuit, Graham,’ she greeted him. ‘You and your platonic friend.’
‘You should talk. How long have you been carrying on with your fisherman? Since you cleared off to your mother’s, eighteen months ago, I suspect – and I haven’t forgotten the night when we first got back together, either.’
‘Suspect all you like, I’m protesting my innocence, just like you and Lucy. But you put your petition in, with your non-existent evidence from your non-existent private detective and then I’ll carry on like you did last time. You’ll end up having to chase me down with bailiffs to get the acknowledgement of service back, and before your petition for divorce on the grounds of my adultery gets into court, I’ll have my cross-petition ready. Your boss’s daughter will be nursing her shameful bundle by the time there’s any divorce. How’s that?’
‘I’d never have believed you could be so bloody spiteful, but you’ll never get the satisfaction. She’ll have an abortion before she’ll let that happen.’
Lynn’s jaw dropped. ‘Are you telling me she’d do away with her own child, just to save face?’
‘It’s not a child, yet. And if you ever accuse her of being pregnant, she’ll deny it – and I’ll back her up.’
Lynn shook her head in disgust, and then echoed her solicitor’s words: ‘Well, in that case, we seem to have reached an impasse.’ She rose to make a dignified exit, but Graham barred her way.
‘There’ll be no impasse. I’ve stopped paying the mortgage. You’ll be out before much longer, whether you like it or not.’
‘And you’re going back to Mummy’s, are you, to live the single life and wait for me to trip up? Are you sure you’ve thought this through, Graham? In the first pla
ce, you’ll trip up a lot sooner than I will. In the second place you’ll never get another mortgage if you get foreclosed. That won’t impress your boss. In the third place you’ll still be married, with a wife and child to maintain – and no grounds for divorce, and that won’t impress Lucy. In the fourth place, dynamite wouldn’t blast me out of this house after your mother threatened to change the locks on me, and the building society won’t manage it, either. Not without taking me to court. Do you really want to give the golf club cognoscenti so much to chew over? Not to mention the ones at the fruit shop.’
‘What do you suggest, then?’
‘Sign the house over to me. I’ll take over the mortgage.’
‘You’re a woman.’
‘You don’t say!’
‘I mean they won’t let you take on the mortgage.’
‘I’ll have a male guarantor. Maybe two. Maybe three.’
‘We’re back to Alec McCauley, then. He’s going to guarantee your debts – and you’re trying to tell me you’re not sleeping with him.’
‘I’m not trying to tell you anything, except that as soon as this house belongs to me I will sleep with him – just to oblige you and Lucy. Then you’ll have all the tongues wagging in sympathy with you, and you can divorce your trollopy fishwife without paying her a penny in maintenance and live happily ever after with your fairy princess – with none of the shit sticking to her. How’s that for a bargain?’
He was quiet for a while, thinking it over. ‘I’m sorry it’s come to this,’ he said, eventually.
‘Oh, give up!’
‘No – I’m genuinely sorry. But for a man who wants to get on in life, you make a hopeless wife, Lynn.’
‘No doubt you’ll fare much better with the boss’s daughter,’ she said, certain that Graham’s unending stream of other women was not about to stop for Lucy or anyone else. So how would the boss’s daughter fare with Graham, she wondered? She might turn out to be another Connie – happy to turn a blind eye to it all, even if it included her own mother. That would certainly earn her the approval of her mother-in-law.
Chapter 64
Naturally, Graham got the best of the bargain when, a month later, he sold his interest in the house to Lynn. In order not to impede the divorce with any hint of collusion between the parties, Lynn’s father and brother put up money provided by Alec and acted as guarantors for the mortgage, in the certain knowledge that Alec was the ultimate guarantor and that as soon as Lynn was divorced he intended to redeem the mortgage with his own savings, plus a loan from his father.
As soon as the transactions were completed Connie reclaimed all Auntie Ivy’s antiques and put them back into storage, probably more to Lynn’s satisfaction than to her own. The house was cleared of them before Alec stepped off the ferry.
Lynn’s father was ashore on that day, and he went to pick Simon up from school and take him back to Boulevard – to let the guilty pair go alone to the house on Snuff Mill Lane and concentrate on giving Graham and his private detective enough ammunition to start divorce proceedings.
It was with a feeling of victory that Lynn turned the key and opened the door. So much for Connie’s threats about changing locks. The house was hers, and Graham had given up all claim on it. She’d won.
She turned to Alec. ‘Are you going to carry me over the threshold?’
He hoisted her into his arms and carried her inside. ‘It feels a bit funny, carrying another feller’s wife over his threshold and into his house,’ he said.
‘It’s our house now, and I haven’t been his wife for months,’ she said, ‘and seeing they’ve taken everything that belonged to them there’s nothing of theirs in it. The carpets belonged to the folk who went to Australia. But if it bothers you, we’ll put it up for sale.’
‘Really?’
She nodded. ‘Yep. Any time you like, as long as we can live somewhere near, so Simon doesn’t have to change schools again.’
There were no neighbours near enough to be scandalised by Alec’s staying in the house overnight, but a car stopped outside in the wee small hours of the morning. It drove away again after Alec had been to the door in his pyjamas, on the pretext of bringing in the milk. After a leisurely breakfast they took a taxi down to Boulevard to see Simon and Lynn’s father, run ragged by all five grandsons, who soon surrounded Alec.
‘We’re going to the Saturday matinee, with Grandad and Auntie Margaret!’ Simon beamed up at him.
‘What to see?’
‘A cowboy film!’ George exclaimed.
‘I like cowboys,’ Alec said. ‘I’ve just got to nip down to the dock offices for a minute, to see about a ship. If I’m back in time, I’m coming with you.’
‘Great!’ Lynn said. ‘While you’re all enjoying yourselves, I’ll be at work.’
On Sunday evening Lynn took Simon with them in the taxi to see Alec off on the ferry to New Holland. He gave Lynn a squeeze and a peck on the cheek, and ruffled Simon’s hair. ‘See you in three weeks,’ he said, and followed the queue towards the ferry.
‘Can we go and see another cowboy?’ Simon shouted after him.
Alec turned his head ‘Yeah.’
‘With Auntie Margaret’s lads?’
‘Of course!’
They waved him off, then Lynn turned to Simon. ‘School in the morning,’ she said, and ushered him into the taxi for the journey back to Snuff Mill Lane and bed. When they passed the fruit shop on Bricknall Avenue she imagined the sort of things Connie would soon be saying: she’s just like her mother . . . et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And no doubt she was in many ways, Lynn thought – but she was determined to make a better wife for a trawlerman than her mother ever had.
Chapter 65
‘I thought I might have been asked to give evidence at that inquiry into the Sprite after being on her when that feller took an axe to the steering gear. The radar had failed twice before we even got to Scarborough. She was a terrible ship,’ Alec said, thoughtfully, when he returned to Hull in the middle of October to sail as mate on one of Hull’s older ships.
‘Well, it’s all wrapped up now,’ Lynn said. ‘If they’d taken evidence from everybody that knew something was wrong with the Sprite, they’d have been stuck in the City Hall till next Pancake Tuesday. They’ve moved on to the Prospero, now.’
‘I’m not complaining,’ Alec said. ‘I didn’t actually want to do it. If I’d had to go, it would have meant missing a trip. I wonder when the report will come out, though? It might make interesting reading.’
‘Oh, I’ll just have a squint in my crystal ball,’ Lynn said. ‘Here’s how interesting it will be – if they can’t pin the blame on the skipper or the crew, they’ll find out that nobody was to blame.’
He laughed. ‘We’ll wait and see. Well, we’ve got five days to enjoy ourselves before I sail. How do you fancy a cowboy at the Saturday matinee?’
‘I don’t mind, I’m on holiday this weekend. Simon will love it. He loves to go to Boulevard to get in among Margaret’s lads, but the other day he asked me if he could stay at home next time you come. Now I know why. You’re nothing but an overgrown kid yourself,’ she said.
‘Does he realise . . .’ Alec began.
Lynn gave a closed-lip smile, and nodded. ‘I don’t know how much. He knows his dad’s gone back to live with Connie and Gordon, but not the ins and outs of everything.’
‘We’ll have to be ever so careful, Lynn. Take it slowly. Never try to stop him seeing his own dad,’ Alec said.
‘Not much chance of you doing that is there, here for three days out of every three weeks. No sooner home than you’re gone again. The real question is, does Graham want to see his son? Not showing much sign of it, up to now.’
The wreck report on the three trawlers came out on the first of November. The loss of the Sprite had come as no surprise at all to any of the fishermen who had sailed in her, and the cause of it was plain to see. According to them she was slow and unstable, she leaked like a sieve, and had probl
ems with the radar, radio, and the winch. According to the official inquiry her loss was an unfathomable mystery. She’d had a survey, Lloyds had classed her A1 and the owners had managed to get her insured, so as far as the court was concerned, she was A1 and watertight. The Icelander who’d heard the Mayday must have been mistaken, and the ship must have gone down where the life-raft was found. The multifarious problems she’d been notorious for before the survey were not looked into, nor was there much probing into the owners’ motives for failing to raise the alarm when their attempts to make radio contact with her had failed.
Lynn and Margaret decided to have Bonfire Night at Boulevard. To have had it at Snuff Mill Lane might have been too painful a reminder to Margaret’s lads of the father they had lost. Grandad and Alec were both at sea and since the boys were at school the following day, the party was small and short. Lynn put Simon to bed at Boulevard, and spent the evening with Margaret. When the boys were settled they sat with the television off, drinking tea and toasting their toes by the coal fire.
‘What do you think to the report on the Sprite?’ Margaret asked.
‘What’s there to think? The owners sent a notoriously unstable ship to dangerous seas at the worst possible time of year, with an inexperienced skipper and no radio operator. Then they failed to alert anybody for nearly a fortnight after they lost radio contact with her – and they’re not to blame for anything! That’s the way it is. That’s the way it always will be.’
‘One of the skippers told the court there was nothing wrong with her,’ Margaret said.
The Would-Be Wife Page 31