‘This looks a really nice place for a picnic. It’s not crowded. Shall we come back here after the pier?’
‘Looks a bit quiet to me,’ Sadie said.
‘But after all the excitement of doing all the things we want to do, the boys will need a nap and we might need a bit of peace and quiet.’
‘I suppose …’ Sadie said without much enthusiasm.
‘We’ll decide later then.’ Johnnie appeased her as he always did.
He continued driving back towards the pier and then parked as near to it as he could.
They crammed both children, one each end, into the borrowed carrycot and caught the train to the end of the pier before walking all the way back and spending time in the amusements on the other side of the road. Johnnie did his best to make sure everyone had a good time but he was really just itching to get back to the part of the beach that was opposite the hotel. It certainly wasn’t the best part of the beach for a picnic, with a concrete slope and just a small strip of sand before the mud, but he convinced Sadie it was perfect. He collected two deck chairs and carefully positioned them near one of the seaweed-covered breakwaters, then put the carrycot with a sleeping Paul in the shade of it.
Then he sat in the deck chair that gave a perfect view of the hotel doorway and left the other, which faced towards the sea, for Sadie.
She’d packed quite a spread into the picnic basket, and as she laid it all out carefully on the rug Johnnie started to feel guilty all over again. His conscience was shouting at him to gather everything up and go right back to the other end of the promenade, as far away from the Thamesview Hotel as he could get, but once it was all spread out he told himself it was too late. He had no choice but to stay there.
The longer they sat there the more Johnnie started to relax and enjoy himself. Martin was happily trying to make mud pies with his baby bucket and spade, and he was making Sadie laugh. It was a perfect family day out and Johnnie promised her they’d do it more often.
And then he saw her.
It was the hair that he saw first and then the person. He wasn’t sure he would have recognised her if it hadn’t been for the hair. The dark red hair was the first thing he had noticed when he’d seen her sitting on her suitcase in Elsmere Road and it was the first thing he noticed now.
Red, he had called her then. Ruby Red. The coltish young girl who was far too young and innocent for him. Now she looked so tall and ladylike that it jolted him. He stretched out in the deck chair and watched carefully so Sadie didn’t see him looking. She didn’t know Ruby or anything about her, but she hated Johnnie even glancing at another woman so he knew she’d sit up and take notice if she got even a hint of Johnnie’s wandering attention.
He didn’t move a muscle as Ruby walked down the two front steps of the hotel with another woman about her age and the two of them crossed the road almost where the Riordan family were sitting with the remains of the picnic between them. His heart thumped with the fear of being caught, of Ruby seeing him and saying hello. It was so fierce he was sure Sadie would hear. He wanted to run but there was no way of escaping without being spotted.
‘Are we mud-paddling today, my Lady Ruby of Thamesview, or is wandering round with your skirt in your knickers on a Sunday a bit beneath you now?’ The other woman’s voice carried, as did her laugh.
Ruby laughed. ‘Stop taking the mick, you. I’m up for a paddle if you are!’
‘I’ve got me best slacks on,’ the other woman said in mock horror.
‘Roll them up. If I can tuck my skirt up then you can roll your trouser legs.’
‘’Spose I’ve got no choice.’
Without even glancing at them the two women walked within a few feet of the Riordan family to the edge of the mud, took their shoes off and left them on the sand. Ruby gathered her skirt up and the other woman carefully rolled the legs of her slacks up to her knees and held on to them.
‘Come on then,’ Ruby said with a wide grin. ‘It’s not that cold!’
Johnnie didn’t move a muscle as he watched them walk out onto the mud together and then stand there squelching their toes and giggling, the unknown woman with her trouser legs up by her knees and Ruby with her skirt clutched up in a bundle around her thighs.
‘I tried to get Tony in to do this the other morning but he refused point-blank.’
‘Beneath his dignity, of course. Tony never lets his hair down that I can see.’
‘Not often, but he’s a nice man deep down …’ Ruby giggled and kicked at the water that was pooling in the natural gulleys as the tide came in. ‘Aaah, we’re going to get cut off by the tide. We’ll drown in a sodding great whirlpool of mud and sludge and our bodies will never be found.’
‘Don’t be daft, we’re only a few feet from shore. We could go out to the Ray and have a swim,’ Gracie said, referring to the natural sandbank in the distance.
‘Never in a million years. It’s all right for you, you can swim!’
They laughed together, oblivious to the beachgoers out on the strip of sand. There weren’t many but those that were there were watching and laughing as well.
All apart from Sadie Riordan.
‘Look at those stupid cows,’ Sadie suddenly said. ‘Have they got no shame? Acting like schoolkids at their age. All dressed up and nowhere to go, my mother used to say.’
Her voice was so loud that Johnnie knew they must have heard her, but if they had it made no difference; they carried on doing what they were doing.
‘If they splash one of the kids I’ll tell ’em their fortune.’
Johnnie wanted to say something, to tell Sadie how miserable she was, but he was scared to open his mouth. Instead he sank further down in the deck chair with his arms crossed and his chin on his chest, hoping Sadie would think he was dozing off. Turning his head to one side he watched Ruby dancing about and having fun, and he felt really choked. He knew he shouldn’t have gone looking for the past. He should have left it buried.
It took a few moments for Johnnie to realise that Ruby and her friend were playing up to Sadie’s continuing comments. They didn’t look at her but Ruby hoisted her skirt higher and started marching while the other woman laughed long and hard.
‘Bloody ridiculous, I think. Just look at them, stupid women …’ Sadie snarled without looking at him. He didn’t know how to stop her because to comment would make her worse. Suddenly the other woman started to head towards them. ‘Don’t Gracie,’ Ruby said. ‘It doesn’t matter. And anyway we can’t have any of the ladies spotting us out here getting into a brawl.’
But Gracie carried on regardless. ‘Look, you, just ’cos you don’t know how to enjoy yourself don’t mean we can’t. Now shut it.’
Sadie was up out of the deck chair in a flash.
‘Don’t, Sadie. Don’t spoil the day. Please don’t, not in front of the children …’
Sadie hesitated for a moment and then sat down again, albeit with a face like thunder. Gracie looked from one to the other and then, with a shake of her head, turned away. Johnnie sighed with relief; when Sadie wanted to fight she usually went for it without any thought, but this time she held back. Bill Morgan called her spirited, and Johnnie himself had always believed that up until they were married, but the more he got to know her the more he realised that she was that deadly combination of volatility with no self-control.
Mortified, he buried his chin back into his chest. He just wanted them to go away.
He knew the sender of the postcard had been right, and that this was the place; he knew this woman was Ruby Red, and he knew that she was safe and well and seemingly very happy. Much happier than he.
He told himself that was all he’d wanted to find out, all he’d gone there for. He just shouldn’t have taken Sadie and the kids on his jaunt into the past.
‘We’ll have to back over the road like this, you know. Let’s hope we don’t get spotted. It’s not in keeping with our positions, is it, Lady Ruby?’
‘Probably not!’ Ruby picke
d up a handful of mud and started to mould it into a ball.
‘Don’t you dare …’ Gracie laughed, and ran the other way.
As Ruby looked towards Gracie her eyes skimmed past Sadie. Johnnie knew she was glancing at the woman who had nearly started a confrontation but then her glance went past him.
Then she did a double take and he knew instantly that she’d recognised him.
Scared, he met her eyes and pleaded silently. She paused for a split second and then quickly dropped the mud, snatched up her shoes and, after doing a detour to avoid getting too close to him, she started marching back up towards the promenade.
‘Hurry up, Gracie,’ she shouted over her shoulder. ‘We’re late. You’re going to have to catch me up.’
Once both women were out of sight Johnnie sat forward in the deck chair. He didn’t dare look round, especially as Sadie was glaring in their direction to see where they were going, but he didn’t have to look because he knew exactly where they were heading.
He also knew that now he’d seen her he’d be back. Ruby Blakeley still had the power to draw him in.
Twenty-Four
‘What’s the matter?’ Gracie asked breathlessly as she caught up with Ruby. ‘Something’s happened, I know it. Was it the crazy woman back there? She was just jealous because she’s got a boring husband and two kids and isn’t allowed to have fun any more. We’d never give her a room here, miserable cow!’
‘It wasn’t that,’ Ruby said as she carried on walking.
‘Well what then? You just turned and ran off like the devil was hot on your heels.’
‘I don’t want to talk about it. I’m going to get washed and then we have to make a start on dinner. It’s just you and me tonight, but with only four guests it shouldn’t be too hard!’
‘Don’t tell me you turned and ran back to get the dinner on,’ Gracie said. ‘Don’t forget I know you, Lady Ruby.’
‘I said I don’t want to talk about it, not now. I’ll tell you later, promise.’ She paused. ‘Do you mind getting started with the vegetables? I’ve just remembered something I haven’t done. I won’t be long …’
Gracie looked at her. ‘I don’t believe you, but off you go. I’ll get it out of you later.’
Ruby smiled. She knew Gracie was right: she’d pick and pick away until Ruby gave in for a quiet life.
Trying not to run, she went straight into the office and closed the door. Because of the balcony above she knew that no one could see in the window unless they were up close to it, but still she stood to one side and peered around the curtain in the direction of the beach. Because of the steep slope she couldn’t see anything below the level of the pavement but she carried on looking and waiting and cursing the people walking and driving by on both sides of the road.
As she watched and waited so she reran the whole event in her mind. It had been such a shock to see Johnnie Riordan again she had felt physically sick. She’d seen the family there, heard the woman making silly comments and wanted to look at her. But then she’d seen the man with her.
It was the shape of the man’s head, his fair hair, his long angular body folded up in the deck chair. Her recognition had been instant and after the shock her immediate instinct had been to smile and acknowledge him as she would any old friend, but his fearful eyes had told her not to.
Because of that she could only assume that the tarty, aggressive woman he was with was his wife and that the two tiny children were his. She hadn’t had time to study the woman but it made her feel sad to think of the lively ambitious man she’d known being too scared of his wife even to acknowledge someone from his past.
And they had two children. If they were his then there were two children related to Maggie.
Half-siblings to his daughter whom he knew nothing about.
She shook her head away from that thought and pondered on why he had chosen that that particular strip of beach to have his family picnic. But as she thought about that so she wondered at the coincidence of her brother Ray and Johnnie Riordan both finding out where she was. The last two people she had ever wanted to find her. There they both were, in or near an obscure little hotel on Southend seafront, but nowhere near the regular day-tripper areas.
The more she thought about it, the more concerned she became, and the emotional impact of seeing him was overshadowed by the realisation that it was nigh on impossible for it to have been coincidence that, after all those years, both Ray and Johnnie found where she was and had turned up within a few months of each other.
Ray had said that ‘a little bird’ had told him; maybe the same little bird had told Johnnie. Maybe it was someone trying to cause problems for her. But she had no idea who or why.
Suddenly Johnnie appeared at the top of the steps carrying a carrycot towards a car that was parked nearby. He pushed it onto the back seat and then went back for all the other stuff while the woman, who was done up like a dog’s dinner, appeared with the little boy on her hip and climbed straight into the car.
Once she was in the car and everything was packed in the boot, Ruby saw Johnnie look across at the hotel; he stood behind the open boot where the woman couldn’t see him and just looked in her direction, deep in thought. Then fiercely he slammed the boot down, climbed into the driver’s seat and Ruby heard the engine start. As he pulled away she saw him take one last look across at where she was standing.
She knew then that there was no coincidence.
‘Gracie, can I ask you something?’ she said when she had calmed down.
‘Of course you can. Is this to do with earlier when you had a funny turn on the beach?’
‘Sort of, but not really. Who can you think of who’d want to cause me some upset?’
‘No one that I know of. You don’t go round upsetting people like I do,’ Gracie said, looking sideways at her friend. ‘What makes you think that?’
‘I was wondering who could have told Ray where I was. He wouldn’t say how he knew.’
‘I can’t think of anyone. You’re not an enemy-gathering person.’
Ruby frowned and went over to the kitchen sink. ‘Have you done all the vegetables? You shouldn’t have, I said I wouldn’t be long.’
‘Oh, bugger the vegetables, there’s something you’re not telling me. Come on, Ruby, we’re friends – thick and thin – who know each other’s darkest secrets.’
Ruby took a deep breath. ‘You know that family on the beach, the brassy woman who was chuntering on like an old granny about us?’
‘I knew it was something to do with her, but we did carry on just to annoy her even more, show-offs that we are,’ Gracie laughed. ‘Daft bint.’
‘It’s not to do with her, it’s to do with the man who was with her. Did you look at him?’
‘Yeah, hen-pecked and scared. He didn’t move a muscle while she carried on, just pretended not to notice. Yellow belly—’
‘It was Johnnie Riordan,’ Ruby said. ‘There, I’ve told you. It was Johnnie Riordan.’
‘Johnnie who?’ Gracie said, and then it dawned. ‘Noooo. Are you sure? How can you be sure? He didn’t look like the spivvy jack-of-all-trades you’d described. That bloke looked more like a well-trained dog.’
‘Of course I’m sure. I had his baby, didn’t I?’ Ruby said calmly.
‘Sorry. Just wondering when it happened …’
‘You know when it happened. You and me both,’ Ruby glared.
‘No, not that. I mean his castration! Bet he can sing bloody good soprano now.’ Gracie starting singing high.
‘He did look a bit scared of her, I must admit,’ Ruby said with a slight smile. ‘But that’s all by the by. I’ve got a puzzle for you. After all these years what do you think are the chances of him just happening to turn up on the beach out front? I mean, first Ray shows up and now Johnnie.’
‘Maybe they’re the fortune-hunters George and Babs warned you about.’
‘Don’t be daft. For a start, they don’t even know I’ve inherited. No one does
.’
‘As far as we know no-one knows. Word can get out, although I promise you I’ve not said a single word to anyone.’
‘I know,’ Ruby said. ‘But I think I’m going to go back to Walthamstow for a visit. To see Ma and Nan, make some peace. It’s time. And if I can find out from Ray how he knew where to find me that’ll be a bonus.’
‘And Johnnie?’
‘That door is shut. Looks like he’s made himself a nasty little bed to lie in.’
‘Are you going to tell Tony about Johnnie and Maggie?’
Ruby looked at her friend and shook her head. ‘Never in a million years. He’s not the sort of man to be that understanding, is he?’
‘No, I guess not.’ Gracie smiled but her tone was sad. ‘Mind you, I haven’t told Sean either.’
‘Some secrets are best left where they are, buried in the past.’
‘How would you feel about not living at the hotel any more?’ Tony Alfredo asked Ruby.
‘What a strange question. I have to live at the hotel: it’s my home and my job.’
Ruby looked across the table at him. They’d been for a walk to the nearby Southchurch Park and then gone back to the café. It was packed out with mostly holidaymakers so they were tucked away at a tiny table right next to the kitchen. Ruby was relieved it was so hectic because it meant Mamma and Papà Alfredo hadn’t got time to take any notice of them.
‘Papà has said I can live in the flat upstairs here. He wants to let it out, so who better than his son? And it’s fully furnished, a perfect first home.’
‘Why would you want to do that when you’ve got a mother who does everything for you and desperately wants to keep you tucked safely under her wing?’ Ruby laughed. ‘Everything you could ever want is in that house. I bet you’ve never so much as picked up a saucepan!’
‘But I don’t want to live at home any more. The time has come to move on and settle down away from home.’ He paused and fumbled in his pocket. ‘With you. I want to live with you.’
‘But I live with Gracie.’ Ruby frowned, not quite sure of what he meant.
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