The Secrets Women Keep

by Fanny Blake

  ‘I’m going for a walk. Anybody want to come?’ Terry leaned over the rustic fence.

  ‘I will.’ Anna sat up and gathered her still damp hair, twisting it into a knot on the top of her head. She rammed her biro through it to secure it in place. ‘We might meet him on his way back. I won’t be a minute.’ She left all her belongings exactly where they were, scattered about her lounger.

  Rose swung her legs round and bent forward to pick them up, glad of something to do.

  ‘Leave them,’ advised Eve. ‘She can get them later. You don’t have to clear up after them any more.’

  Rose straightened up. ‘You’re right. Just habit. Why don’t you get yourself ready and then there’ll be time for a farewell Prosecco before you go. We’ll toast the downfall of Amy.’

  An hour and a half later, Rose and Eve were on the terrace. The cork had just been popped from the bottle and two chilled glasses were being filled. Next door’s ginger cat had made itself at home on one of the chairs. Beside them, Eve’s red case stood to attention, ready for the journey home.

  ‘To the Rutherford Agency and down with its detractors.’ Rose raised her glass and clinked it with Eve’s.

  ‘To you and Dan. May you work it out.’ They clinked again.

  ‘We will,’ said Rose, as confidently as she could manage. ‘We’ll get through this. We may need a bit of time to sort things. That’s all. I only wish I hadn’t said anything now. If I hadn’t, he would almost certainly have seen sense and realised what was important in his own good time.’

  ‘Well, you did.’ Eve could be relied on for down-to-earth pragmatism. ‘So you’ll have to deal with it. But I know you will.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘Terry’s cutting it a bit fine. I wonder where they’ve got to.’

  As if on cue, the sound of rapid footsteps on the path made them turn. It was Anna, alone, half running, her feet slipping out of her espadrilles. There was no sign of Terry or Daniel.

  Afterwards, Rose would remember how she had first noticed the bloody scrapes on Anna’s knees, her legs covered in grey dust from the track, the stricken expression on her face as she kicked off her shoes and raced towards them over the grass. Her hair had come untied and was streaming out behind her.

  ‘Whatever’s happened?’ But Rose didn’t expect Eve to answer.

  Both women were already on their feet. They had only taken a few steps forward when Anna reached her mother, flinging herself at her, almost bowling her over. Instinctively Rose put her arms round her daughter and led her, sobbing and incoherent, to a chair. As she pulled one out, Eve’s case was knocked over, forgotten.

  ‘Anna! What is it? What’s happened?’ She tried to make out what Anna was saying, but the words weren’t making sense. They were lost among the frenzied sobbing and gasps for air.

  ‘Where’s Terry? What the hell’s happened?’ Eve sounded terrified.

  ‘It’s Dad . . .’ was all Anna could choke out. Then, ‘Terry’s stayed with him. You’ve got to come. He . . .’

  As her daughter tried to go on, Rose felt herself disconnecting from the scene. Something terrible had happened to Daniel. Something worse than terrible. The sun still shone, the trees moved in the breeze, a black beetle scuttled past her foot, but she was locked off from it all, at one remove from everything. There was a rushing in her ears as if she was being swept underwater. She could see Anna’s mouth moving, her face wet with tears, her hair wild. Only the noise of her daughter’s crying anchored her to reality.

  Rose felt Eve’s arm round her shoulder. She shook her off, trying to move away from Anna, not wanting to hear whatever she was struggling to say. But Anna was clinging to her, wiping her nose on the back of her arm, crying, crying as if she would never stop.

  ‘You’ve got to come . . .’ Anna stumbled to her feet, pulling at Rose’s hand. ‘We . . .’

  Rose stared at her, felt her hands rising to cover her ears. She didn’t want to hear. She didn’t want any of this to be real.

  For a moment Anna looked as though she wasn’t going to be able to go on, but somehow she regained sufficient control. ‘We found him.’ She paused, aware that two pairs of terrified eyes were on her, waiting. ‘He’s about a mile back down the track.’

  ‘But he’s on his way home?’ Rose said, desperately seeking assurance as she extricated her hand from her daughter’s grasp. She needed to talk to Daniel. They had so much to say to one another, to sort out. So much unfinished business.

  ‘Terry’s called the police.’

  ‘Police? Why? What’s happened? Is he OK?’ But she knew. She knew.

  Anna gazed at Rose. Rose saw the fear and the pity in her daughter’s eyes. She saw how reluctant she was to be the one to break the news. She watched her bite her bottom lip, how it slid away from under her teeth. She could see the white mark of an old chickenpox scar above her mouth. She watched how Anna closed her eyes and took another breath. She saw the fine blue veins on her eyelids. Then:

  ‘He’s collapsed. We couldn’t find a pulse. Terry’s trying . . .’ She stopped again, as Rose and Eve waited, silent. ‘Mum . . . I think he might be dead.’

  Eve gasped. Then, silence. Even Anna was quiet. It was as if they were waiting for Rose to react, so say something, to make it all right.

  A bird trilled in the walnut tree. A butterfly flew past, then another.

  Rose felt something give way inside her. She felt herself being cradled in someone’s arms. A glass of water. A rug around her shivering shoulders. She heard a murmur of voices so far away. She needed to see Dan. She had to speak to him. He couldn’t leave her now, not when they had so much left to say. She heard a long-drawn-out wail, the sound of someone suffering terrible grief. It was never-ending. Never-ever-ending. Would they never stop? Then she realised. That keening was coming from her. And nothing she could do would silence it.

  January

  12

  Rose was late. Eve was standing in the theatre foyer, just beginning to wonder whether she should leave the ticket with the box office and go in alone. She checked the time. Five minutes till curtain-up. The other theatregoers were filing past both sides of the small bar into the auditorium. The unpromisingly titled Rubbish had been written by the husband of one of Eve’s authors. Billed as ‘a climate-change comedy’, the concept had made her heart plummet. However, presented with two complimentary tickets from said proud author, she’d accepted gracefully, while wondering which of her friends she could strong-arm into accompanying her.

  She hadn’t asked Rose. A comedy, however politically incorrect, didn’t seem the appropriate invitation when Dan’s memorial was taking place two days later. But when on the phone she moaned about having to go, Rose had volunteered to keep her company. ‘Everybody’s still treating me like a piece of cut glass, only inviting me to the dullest events in case I crack up at the sight of someone enjoying themselves. I’d like to.’

  She had insisted, and now she wasn’t going to make it. Eve was almost the last person in the foyer when Rose materialised in the doorway, long brown and tan zigzag-patterned coat blowing out behind her as she stuffed her gloves into her bag. As she removed her fur hat, Eve noticed that her face had filled out a little. Rose had lost so much weight after Dan’s death, it was a relief to see the terrible gauntness less pronounced and some life back in her eyes.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ she panted. ‘Roadworks. Anyway, I’m here now.’

  They embraced with a kiss, and followed the stragglers into the auditorium. Forcing an entire row to stand up, the two of them shuffled gratefully along to their seats. They were still removing their coats as the lights went down. As Eve wrestled her bag under her seat, she was aware of Rose glancing around her, then stiffening, her gaze fixed on someone in the scaffold of the circle.

  ‘Who is it?’ Eve scanned the couple of rows of faces, almost indistinguishable in the gloom.

  Rose whispered something and gripped Eve’s wrist as if she was trying to break it, then, remembering where she was, l
et go. At that moment, the stage lights went up and a dustbin lid crashed. Further talk was impossible as the cast hurled themselves into what turned out to be a sharp, fast-paced script that was far more entertaining than the title had suggested. Relieved that she would not have to pretend her appreciation to the playwright’s wife, but concerned about Rose, Eve occasionally cast a brief sideways glance at her friend to check she was enjoying it too. Although Rose’s gaze was directed at the stage, she looked as if she were a million miles away.

  When the interval arrived, Rose stared up to her left again as the house lights came on. Then she shook her head. ‘How stupid of me,’ she muttered.

  ‘Someone you know?’ Eve had her bag on her lap and was standing ready to go to the bar. ‘I already ordered interval drinks. Merlot OK?’

  ‘Perfect,’ Rose replied, leading the way out. As they reached the aisle, she looked upwards again. ‘I thought I saw Dan. Him.’ She gestured towards a man reading his programme. ‘It isn’t, of course, but don’t you think they’re alike?’

  Eve stared at the man in question, trying to spot a resemblance. Perhaps the shape of the nose in profile. A bit. Perhaps the chin at a certain angle. Dan with a haircut, maybe. But swarthier, greyer, older. Perhaps. ‘No, not really,’ she concluded.

  ‘When we come back, and the lights go down, take another look.’ And Rose started up the stairs. ‘I often see him.’

  Startled, Eve watched her back, her shoulder blades visible under her lavender jumper. Was Rose deluded with grief? Still? Four months after Dan’s death and Eve had hoped that she was coping a little better now the first wave of terrible debilitating sorrow had broken.

  They stood squashed together as the crowd swelled around them. Rose, seeming untroubled, looked about her. ‘I didn’t notice that,’ she said in reply to Eve’s criticism of one of the actors. ‘I still can’t concentrate on anything, but at the same time, I do want to get back to normal. Well, the new normal. Seeing Dan threw me. It shouldn’t, though,’ she went on without giving Eve a chance to interrupt. ‘I’ve seen him before.’

  ‘You have?’ For once, Eve didn’t know how to react. What she wanted to do was sweep Rose, who still looked so fragile, into a hug, but even had there been room, she would not have welcomed the gesture. Publicly demonstrative Rose was not.

  ‘Mmm, yes. It’s funny. I don’t find it upsetting, not any more. At first it was, well . . . odd, I suppose. I’d see him walking down the street, in a passing car or waiting for me. But then I’d get up close and realise it wasn’t him at all. In a funny way, it’s rather comforting.’

  ‘Comforting? It’d scare the bejaysus out of me.’ Eve took a sip of her very welcome wine.

  ‘It’s the same when I’m at home,’ Rose went on. ‘But different, because of course no one’s there. But I keep expecting him to appear, just like he used to. I imagine a door opening and him standing there.’

  ‘Are you all right living on your own?’ Eve was feeling slightly out of her depth. ‘I rather thought you’d go and stay with Jess.’

  ‘She offered. So sweet of her.’ Their shared but unspoken thought was of Anna, who had done no such thing. ‘But I wouldn’t want to get in their way. She’s got so much on her plate now Dan’s not here to oversee everything. And to be honest, it’s hard spending too long with her or Anna when my decision about what to do with the hotels is hanging over us. Obviously they know that Dan left me his share in the business, so I own two thirds of it now. And they know that Madison Gadding have increased their offer for all three, thanks to Terry. I should make a decision before they withdraw their interest, but equally I don’t want to rush into anything. I want to be sure I do what’s right.’

  ‘People say you’re not meant to do anything for a year,’ Eve advised, then added as an afterthought, ‘I hope Terry hasn’t been pressurising you?’

  Rose shook her head. ‘How is he?’

  ‘Unmanned might be one way of describing it,’ Eve suggested. ‘I know redundancy is always a terrible shock, but he’s taken it so badly. And on top of Daniel’s death.’

  ‘I’m sorry I haven’t done more.’ Rose ran the tip of her finger around the rim of her glass.

  ‘For heaven’s sake, woman, you’ve had enough on your plate without this. He’ll get through in the end.’ But remembering the Terry she’d left at home, Eve was less sure than she sounded. ‘He didn’t see it coming at all. He needs to work, for his own self-esteem more than anything, but there are no jobs around. And he’s hardly in the first flush.’

  Before she could say any more, the bell cut their conversation short. Back in their seats, Eve followed Rose’s gaze to the man in the circle.

  ‘How funny,’ Rose said wistfully. ‘He’s not like Dan at all.’ She wrapped her arms around her body as if comforting herself.

  Afterwards they emerged into the freezing night and trudged through the frozen slush, the last bleak reminder of the snowstorms that a week earlier had thrown the country into chaos. They headed towards the French restaurant Eve had chosen.

  Tucked into a side booth, they got the ordering out of the way – two steak and chips and two glasses of house red – before Eve asked, ‘How are you, Rose? Really.’

  Rose leaned back against the seat, her bony left hand flat on the table, the other playing with her engagement and wedding rings that slid up and down her finger as easily as they twisted round, much looser now. ‘I don’t know,’ she replied. ‘I was so shocked, so bewildered at first. My life seemed to have stopped dead while everyone else’s was going on without me. Now I feel as if I’m slowly coming to my senses. I’ve got to keep putting one foot in front of the other; it’s all I can do.’

  ‘Will you be all right for the memorial on Wednesday?’

  ‘I think so. I’ve had so many lovely letters, some from people I’ve never met, who are all coming. The weird thing is they all talk about another Dan rather than the one I knew.’ She stopped playing with her rings and waited while the waiter poured their drinks. ‘No one says a bad word about him! Of course they wouldn’t, but they all conjure up some kind of saint. And that he wasn’t! It’s as if there were two of him. In fact, sometimes I think I like their Dan more than the one I had.’

  ‘You’re not still worrying about that affair? If that’s what it was.’ Over the intervening months, Eve had wondered whether the whole text message thing hadn’t been blown out of all proportion.

  There was a pause as the waiter put their food in front of them.

  ‘Not worrying, no. It’s over. But sometimes I feel so angry with him for screwing everything up just before he died. How could he do that?’ Rose gripped her knife so her knuckles turned white.

  ‘He was trying to tell you,’ Eve reminded her, remembering her own final conversation with him. ‘Us all being there made it impossible. We’ve talked about this.’ And they had, time and time again. In the confusion of the days following Dan’s death, Rose didn’t remember their conversations. She forgot them in the same way she forgot arrangements she had made, or went to keep appointments at the wrong time, or left the iron on, or forgot to leave the money for the cleaner. Then she’d make Eve laugh by confessing her latest slip-up, unable to believe she could have been so stupid, smiling at her own incompetence.

  Afterwards they would return to the ghastly business of registering the death, repatriating the body and telling friends and family back home. Eve hadn’t flown back to England as planned but had left Amy to manage the agency after all. Somehow the four of them – Rose, Eve, Terry and Anna – had negotiated that ghastly evening together: the visit to the hospital, the nightmare of not being able to understand clearly what they were being told, of waiting for someone who could translate for them, the sight of Daniel lying alone, cold. None of them knowing what to do.

  ‘Was he?’ asked Rose, sawing at her steak. ‘Wasn’t he just a man with a thirty-one-year itch who thought he could get away with it?’

  This was new. During the couple of weeks
since they had last seen each other, the old Rose had apparently lifted a corner of her shroud of despair and begun to peep out. During the immediate aftermath of Dan’s death – a brain haemorrhage, they’d said once a doctor who spoke fluent English had been found, which translated as a massive stroke – Rose had shut down. In those first terrible days, Eve had found it hard to control her own grief while she tried to support her friend. Meanwhile Rose herself remained stony-faced, concentrating on all the necessary administration as if that would stop her from going under.

  ‘I’m not sure that’s the attitude you should have just before his memorial service!’

  ‘True,’ Rose agreed with a smile. ‘But they’ll all be there celebrating the life of the man I thought I knew when I obviously didn’t really and now I never will. That’s quite a thing to come to terms with.’ She paused as a thought struck her. ‘You don’t think she’ll be there, do you?’

  ‘Who? “S”? She wouldn’t have the nerve.’

  ‘But we wouldn’t necessarily know. It happens in films all the time.’ Rose mused. ‘She’ll be wearing a black suit and a tiny black hat with a veil . . .’ She picked up a French fry in her fingers and stared at it.

  ‘And looking deranged,’ added Eve, warming to the theme. ‘She’ll be peering out from behind a gravestone, or standing almost hidden by a yew tree, watching us all file into the church . . .’

  They laughed, then Eve raised her glass. ‘To Dan. Whoever he was.’