by Maureen Lee
‘I think you’re exaggerating a bit, Jeannie. I haven’t a clue how many times. I didn’t count. I was hardly aware of what I was doing. I told you, I was stoned.’ To her intense irritation, he shrugged yet again. ‘Anyroad, it was a long time ago. I was younger then. These days, I behave like a monk – except with you, my wife.’
‘You don’t seem a bit ashamed,’ she said indignantly.
‘Oh, I am, babe.’ He laughed, but it came out more like a snort. ‘I’m dead ashamed.’
It struck her that he was behaving very strangely. He clearly didn’t give a damn if she’d discovered he’d murdered the girls, not just had sex with them. ‘Is something wrong?’ she asked. ‘Why did you go to see Donald? Fly didn’t know anything about it.’
‘That’s because I didn’t see Donald but, at his suggestion, I went to Harley Street to see a doctor for tests.’
‘Tests?’
‘A blood test, for one. Until an hour ago, I was being accused of making a girl pregnant, remember? The doctor thought it advisable to investigate every possibility – oh, and he gave me a thorough medical at the same time. You’ll be pleased to know I’m in perfect health.
There’s just one thing wrong, only small, and it can easily be put right. I have an obstruction in my epididymis.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘It means the tubes that transport fertile sperm are blocked. In other words, babe, I am unable to father children.’ He smiled at her gently, but his eyes were bitterly accusing. ‘Ever since, I’ve been wondering, where did our two come from?’
Jeannie felt herself blanch. The blood turned cold in her veins and her heart began to beat much too fast. She put her hand to her breast and could feel its loud, rapid thump. ‘Oh, Lachlan!’ she said in a hushed voice.
‘Yes, babe?’
‘I never wanted you to find out.’ It seemed useless to deny it.
‘I’m sure you didn’t, just as I hoped you wouldn’t find out about the girls. But my crimes, if you could call them that, pale into insignificance compared to yours.’ He suddenly stood and flung the mug he was nursing against the wall. Jeannie uttered a little, frightened cry. ‘Whose are they, Jeannie?’ he roared. ‘Who gave you the children that you’ve been pretending all this time were mine?’
‘It doesn’t matter who. And I wasn’t pretending. They are yours. I’ve never thought of them as anything but yours.’
‘They’re not mine. They’re some other guy’s. Who, Jeannie, who?’ He seized her arm and yanked her to her feet, pressed his face against hers.
‘I said, it doesn’t matter,’ she protested weakly.
‘And I say it does. It matters to me, very much. I’d like to know just who the lucky bastard is who’s been fucking my wife.’ He shook her hard. ‘Tell me!’
Jeannie let out a long, slow breath. ‘Sean McDowd.’
Lachlan recoiled as if he’d been shot. ‘Sean!’ His eyes narrowed. ‘He’s always fancied you . . . I didn’t notice, but Fly did. He used to laugh about it. We both decided you wouldn’t give him the time of day. But we were wrong, weren’t we, Fly and me?’ He shook her again. ‘How long has it been going on? Is it still going on?’
‘Are you going to kill me, Lachlan?’
He released her arm. ‘I’m sorry,’ he muttered, sinking back into the chair.
‘Nothing went on,’ she told him. ‘Not in the way you mean. Sean and I didn’t have an affair. The first time we made . . .’ She paused and started again. ‘The first time it happened was in Kevin’s house in Knightsbridge. I think you had a gig in Brighton that night, and I was imagining you having a great time afterwards – it turns out that you were having an even better time than I thought. Anyway, I was feeling very unhappy, very lonely. Sean made a move.’ She swallowed awkwardly. ‘I know I should have stopped him, but I didn’t. Not long afterwards, I found I was expecting Ace, and I realised Sean must be the father.’ She looked at Lachlan pleadingly. ‘I’d been wanting a baby for so long. I never thought of it as his. It was our baby, Lachlan.’ She put her hand on his arm. ‘Ours!’
‘Why didn’t we talk about this before, babe?’ His face was puzzled. ‘I knew you wanted a baby, but I never dreamt it was my fault we never had one.’
‘I didn’t know anything could be done about it, that’s why,’ she cried. ‘It was years and years ago and perhaps then nothing could. I didn’t want you knowing it was your fault. I thought it would upset you.’
‘That’s awfully nice of you, Jeannie, but it wouldn’t have upset me half as much as knowing you’ve had it off with Sean McDowd,’ he said brutally. He shook her hand away. ‘And what happened with Chloe? Did Sean make another move you couldn’t resist, and you found yourself pregnant again?’
‘No.’
‘So, what did happen?’ he pressed.
Jeannie knew she had no alternative but to tell the absolute truth. The air had to be cleared so they could continue with their lives, if not quite in the same way as before. ‘The second time, it was me who made the move,’ she said in a small voice.
‘That’s strange,’ Lachlan said lightly. ‘For the life of me, I can’t imagine you making a move on a guy.’
‘I did it for you. Oh, does that sound daft?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, it’s true. This time it was you wanting a baby, a brother or sister for Ace. Sean and I just happened to come across each other in London. He came to my room – I was staying at the Savoy. You were in Canada.’
He rolled his eyes. ‘The sacrifices some women make for their husbands! I bet you hated every minute. How long did you stay at the Savoy?’
‘Two nights.’
‘Two nights of sheer torture, all on my behalf.’
‘It wasn’t torture.’
‘What was it then?’ He banged his fist on the table. She shrank from the look in his eyes, the bitter, sarcastic tone of his voice. Suddenly, she resented being treated like a whore for sleeping with one man, when he’d slept with God knows how many women. Anger surged in her breast and she replied in a way she would always regret. ‘It was wonderful,’ she said. ‘Quite wonderful.’
Lachlan stared at her blankly, then got up and vomited in the sink. He ran the tap and neither spoke nor moved for a long time. Lachlan stared into the sink and Jeannie at the table, both contemplating the wreckage of their lives.
Without looking at her, Lachlan asked, ‘Does Sean know about the children?’
‘No, of course not.’
The front door opened and Jeannie’s mother shouted, ‘It’s me,’ and a few seconds later she and Chloe came into the kitchen.
Jeannie got to her feet and remarked she should have left ten minutes ago to fetch Ace. Rose said while she was gone she’d prepare the children’s tea. ‘Are you all right, Lachlan?’ she added. ‘You don’t look a bit well.’
Jeannie didn’t hear his reply. She could never remember driving to Southport. Ace complained she was late when she eventually arrived outside the school. He chatted excitedly about something or other all the way home, but Jeannie didn’t hear a word. This was the worst day of her life.
When she drew up outside the house, Lachlan was throwing a suitcase into the boot of the Ferrari. She leapt out of her car. ‘Where are you going?’ she cried.
‘Away. I’ve said goodbye to Chloe, now I want to do the same to Ace. Then I’ll be off.’
‘But where to?’
‘Dunno, babe.’ His mouth twisted nonchalantly. ‘Somewhere or other.’
‘But Lachlan!’ She was frantic now. ‘Oh, darling, we can sort this all out. I love you. I don’t care what you’ve done. If there’d been a thousand women, it wouldn’t matter. Please let’s forgive and forget.’
‘Can’t, babe,’ he said abruptly. ‘I might’ve forgiven you for Ace, but never for Chloe. I’ll never forget, either.’ His face set hard. ‘Never!’
She stamped her foot angrily. Ace had got out of the car and was looking at them anxiously. ‘Then you
mustn’t love me, not the way I love you.’
‘Trouble is, Jeannie, I love you too much. Now, if you wouldn’t mind going inside,’ he gave her a dismissive nod, ‘I’d like a last word with my . . .’ His voice broke. ‘With my son.’
No one could understand it. Why had Lachlan left? The Mirror printed an apology next day. They’d been taken in by a delusional young girl, who’d been egged on by her mother. The identity of the pair wasn’t revealed. Lachlan was completely in the clear, not that anyone who knew him had believed the allegation in the first place.
‘What happened?’ Jeannie’s shocked mother wanted to know. She’d heard him say goodbye to Chloe, and it sounded as if he was going for good.
‘When’s Daddy coming back?’ Ace and Chloe asked frequently.
‘What on earth have you done to him, Jeannie?’ Fly demanded when he rang from London a few days later. ‘He’s in a terrible state.’
‘Nothing,’ Jeannie said weakly. ‘We had a row, that’s all.’
‘It must have been one helluva row!’ Fly snorted. ‘The guy’s virtually suicidal. I keep telling him to go home, but he won’t.’
‘Where’s he living?’
‘He kipped down with me and Stella for a couple of nights, now he’s in some crap hotel. Don’t ask me the name, Jeannie, because he says I’ve not to tell you.’
‘I’ll come straight away if I’m needed, Fly,’ she promised.
‘Yeah! I’ll tell him that.’ He rang off.
Elaine came to Noah’s Ark, looking purposeful, as if she was determined to get to the bottom of things. ‘What exactly is going on, Jeannie? Mum’s terribly upset. You know she hasn’t been very well lately, and your mum thinks it’s a permanent split.’
‘We had a row,’ Jeannie admitted for the umpteenth time.
‘What about?’
‘I think that’s between me and Lachlan, don’t you?’
‘Lachlan is my brother. I’ve a right to know what it’s about.’
‘No, you haven’t,’ Jeannie said stubbornly.
‘Are you getting divorced?’
‘I don’t know.’ The deadly word struck Jeannie like a blow. Please, God, she prayed. Please don’t let it come to that.
‘Is it to do with that girl and her bloody baby? It wasn’t actually true, was it, and Lachlan paid her off ?’
‘No!’
‘Don’t sound so indignant. Some girls of thirteen can look like adults with the right clothes and make-up. Lachlan wouldn’t exactly have been guilty of child abuse, though I could understand you being as mad as hell if he’d done it.’
‘He didn’t touch the girl. He never even met her.’ Jeannie saw a way of distracting her friend from her mission to unearth the truth. ‘If I tell you something, will you promise not to breathe a word to a soul?’
‘Cross my heart and hope to die.’
‘Benny Lucas was behind the whole thing.’ She described her visit to Grenville Street in detail. ‘All I wanted was to throttle the woman, but I have to admit the situation in that house is dire. Under different
circumstances, I’d have felt sorry for Benny. I’d have wanted to help.’
‘I feel like going round and breaking all her windows.’
‘That’s why I’d sooner no one else knows, in case they do.’
The following day Max came. He hadn’t been to the house since around the time of Marcia’s wedding. Now Lachlan had gone he was willing to set foot in the place again. Jeannie saw little of her brother these days. It was hard to believe that this Max, with the lace-up shoes, pressed trousers, and sensible pullover, now Deputy Head of a comprehensive school in Aigburth, had once been a wild rock ’n’ roller. Jeannie noticed the beginnings of a paunch and could have sworn his hair was receding. He’d never remarried and these days didn’t give a damn about his height.
‘What I can’t understand,’ Max said, ‘is how Lachlan can bring himself to walk out on his kids. If I hadn’t wound myself up into such a state when he dumped me, I’d never have let Monica take my two to America. Gareth’s seventeen and I’ve seen hardly anything of him, and even less of Tammy.’ He visited them once a year in the summer holidays, but Monica didn’t make him very welcome.
If only she could tell him, tell someone. She would have valued another man’s judgement. She would have liked his opinion, to know if what she’d done had been so truly awful that Lachlan was justified in walking out on their marriage. Perhaps Max, any man, would have done the same. She wondered if her unwillingness to tell a soul, not even Elaine, with whom she’d once shared all her secrets, meant that in her heart she recognised the enormity of her crime – Lachlan had called it a crime. She’d always thought of herself as a highly moral person, yet she’d acted in a way that only now did she see as quite outrageously wicked.
Jeannie was perplexed. Perhaps Elaine could have explained it to her. She was an expert at understanding people’s minds. Right now, Jeannie didn’t understand anything.
She’d got used to him not being there for a lot of the time, but now she had to accept he wouldn’t be coming back. In the house alone, she played his records at their very loudest, so his voice followed her everywhere. Each time a car drew up on the gravel path, she rushed to the door in case it was him. Ace and Chloe did the same. She told him this in the letters that she wrote every week, saying how much they missed him, how sorry she was about everything. She sent the letters care of Fly. He had no idea if they were read.
‘I give them to him, Jeannie. Whether he opens them or not, I wouldn’t know.’
Christmas came and she tried to make it as normal as possible for the children, inviting loads of people to dinner. They were inundated with gifts, but the present they most wanted was their daddy.
Didn’t he realise, Jeannie thought fretfully, that he was their daddy? Why was he being so perverse? Was it pride? He was making them all suffer because of his stupid pride, himself most of all.
He’d rented a flat in Fulham, a dump, according to Fly, who’d been told not to let her have the address. Now he was back on drugs again – heroin, this time, as well as the uppers and downers.
‘He looks awful,’ Fly said darkly. He had become the bearer of bad news. Was he trying to make her feel guilty? If so, he was succeeding. She felt more guilty with each phone call. ‘Yet the strange thing is, his music has never been so brilliant. He plays the guitar like a man possessed.’
Another New Year, 1983. Jeannie braced herself to face it alone.
Money was becoming a problem. For tax purposes, she and Lachlan had always had their own personal bank accounts, with a separate, joint one for household expenses, into which Lachlan transferred a large sum every month. Her own account was pathetic. She received occasional royalties when a Flower Girls record was played, which didn’t happen often nowadays. The group had become merely history in the annals of rock ’n’ roll.
She guessed what had happened. Lachlan had transferred his account to a London branch and hadn’t thought to reestablish the monthly transfer. She felt sure he wouldn’t be so small-minded as to cancel it.
It wasn’t something she was prepared to mention in the letters she still sent. Somehow, she’d have to manage on her own. Noah’s Ark couldn’t be sold. It belonged to them both, and she wanted it to be there for when Lachlan came back. He would come back, one day, she tried to convince herself.
Managing on her own wouldn’t be easy. All she could do was play the piano. She wondered if she could get a job as a pianist in a club or a hotel. It might still be possible to trade on her name, even if the Flower Girls were now history.
Every day, she went down into the basement and practised for a few hours, but when the bank statements arrived at the beginning of February, she discovered there was no need for her to work. A huge sum, twice as much as before, had been transferred into her personal account.
‘Thank you, darling,’ she whispered. ‘I knew you wouldn’t let us down.’
Two weeks later, F
ly called to say Lachlan had disappeared.
‘Where to?’ Jeannie shrieked.
‘If I knew that, Jeannie, he wouldn’t have disappeared. He didn’t turn up for a rehearsal. When I went round to the flat, his guitar and his clothes were gone. There was a note: “Sorry, but I can’t carry on any more.”’ Fly’s voice broke. ‘I love that guy, Jeannie. I don’t know what I’ll do without Lachlan.’
On a Monday morning in April, Tom Flowers was found dead in his bed. The cleaner had last been there the Thursday before, Mrs Denning had been away that weekend, and Tom had been dead for three days. He was eighty-one and had seemed in the best of health.
‘Oh, it’s a terrible end for a man like him,’ Rose wailed. ‘Dying all alone!’
‘No, Mum, it was the best sort of end,’ Jeannie said sadly. ‘He was still doing our garden till last week. He would have hated being ill. Anyway, in the end, we all die alone.’
The funeral was attended by a surprising number of people. Tom hadn’t exactly been a popular figure in Ailsham, but he’d been a familiar one. Jeannie found it strange to see so many faces she recognised, all much older now. Mrs Denning was the only person to cry. Rose sniffed a bit, Gerald was upset, but Jeannie remained dry-eyed and Max’s face was cold throughout the whole service. He didn’t come to the cemetery with the rest of the family. Both Max’s enemies had now gone – his father and his sister’s husband. Jeannie wondered if it had made him any happier.
A few days later, Tom’s bank rang to say they were holding his will. It had been drawn up shortly after his marriage to Rose, who’d been entirely unaware of its existence. All his worldly possessions, including the house in Disraeli Terrace, had been left to his ex-wife.
‘He must never have got round to making another,’ Rose marvelled. ‘Do you think I should let Mrs Denning have the house?’
‘Don’t be daft, Mum, she’s got a perfectly good house of her own,’ Jeannie said sternly. ‘Sell it. The money would come in useful.’
Surprisingly, Rose decided she would sooner sell Magnolia Cottage and move back to Disraeli Terrace. ‘The cottage is damp and draughty in the winter, and it costs a fortune to keep up.’