Jo ruffled her short hair. ‘Emily would love that,’ she said, briskly. ‘Maybe we could come to yours.’
‘That’d be fantastic. Isla doesn’t know anyone yet really and it’s been a bit hard on her. Her dad and I . . .’ She trailed off again.
I’ve split up from her father and he’s moved his girlfriend’s children into Isla’s old bedroom.
It was my grandmother’s house, she used to have people over all the time. There’s a stain on my bedroom windowsill where Grandi used to break an egg into a glass every Midsummer’s Day, and by the end of the day if the white formed into rigging it meant you were going to marry a sailor.
I’m really quite lonely and have no friends, please like me.
‘Anyway,’ she finished. ‘I’d love to organise some playdates for her.’
‘If you don’t mind me saying so,’ said Jo with a small smile, ‘I think she’s OK. I was in there yesterday doing reading volunteer support and Isla had four kids sitting around her at lunchtime. She was telling them a story. She made one of them cry.’
‘Oh. Oh dear.’
‘Yep.’ Jo grinned at her. ‘But he came back for more. He kept saying, “I’m not crying because I’m scared, go on.”’
Juliet found herself laughing. ‘That sounds like her.’
You seem really nice, can’t we just skip the bit where we dance around each other for a while and go straight on to being friends? Do you like rosé? And Monster Munch? And do you believe ‘Mamma Mia’ to be a genuinely well-made film, and that it is a testament to the patriarchal subjugation of women that it’s still so derided, when people actually write theses on bloody ‘Transformers’? Are you worried about ‘Mamma Mia 2’?
Thankfully there came a faint cry behind them. ‘Muuuuum! Can I have some money?’
‘I’d better go, that’s my son.’ Jo grinned, shrugging her shoulders. ‘He’s in the Co-op. I’ll message you.’
‘I don’t have WhatsApp, or is it Snapchat? I can’t remember which one’s which,’ Juliet admitted. ‘It’s beyond me. And Facebook Messenger. I’m never sure how to get in touch with people – How do you do Snapchat?’
‘It’s like any of these things, Juliet. You just do Snapchat,’ said Jo. ‘Hey Bea.’
Juliet spun round to see her daughter standing behind them, fringe covering her eyes, bike lock slung across her chest, hands sunk into her jeans pockets. She could feel her heart beating wildly in her chest and opened her mouth, unsure of what to say but to her surprise Bea spoke first.
‘Hi, Jo.’ She raised her hand then let it drop, heavily. ‘Ben needs money.’
‘Hi, baby!’ said Juliet, too loudly. ‘I missed you this morning! I didn’t know where you’d gone. How are you?’
Bea fed her fringe through two thin fingers, flattening the hair against her forehead. She looked at her mother suspiciously. ‘Good, yeah, thanks. Oh, hi, George.’
‘Good morning all.’ George appeared behind them, a magazine advert come to life: navy polo shirt, sandy chinos, a turquoise blazer and immaculate trainers that had never seen sweat, much less country mud. He smiled at them. ‘Well, hello, Juliet sweetie, how are you? I see you’ve met the lovely Jo, queen of the village.’
‘Morning, Jo,’ said an elderly man, walking past with a greyhound that was straining at its lead.
‘Hi, Jeremy!’ said Jo, waving cheerily. ‘Hi, Tugie!’
Juliet stared at her. ‘Do you know literally everyone?’
‘Pretty much,’ said Jo. ‘Hi Ciara! Hi Georgina!’ she called to a mother and daughter walking along the other side of the road. She turned back. ‘She’s nice. I didn’t know a soul when we moved here. So I just decided I’d have to make an effort, and it was terrifying. Listen, forget about Messenger or WhatsApp. Just text me when you’ve got a bit of spare time. You’ve got a phone, haven’t you?’
‘I have and I will,’ said Juliet, nodding at her. ‘Bye, Jo.’
Juliet followed Bea and George inside the shop. The door banged loudly behind her, the bell jangling with fury.
‘Hi, Frederic,’ said Bea, wriggling out of the bike lock and hanging it up on the hooks with one fluid motion. She came towards him and kissed him on the cheek. Frederic looked up from his large lined ledger.
‘My dear, hello. George told me you were rather upset – I’ve saved you some Jaffa ca— Oh! Ju!’ he said, catching sight of Juliet, behind George. ‘What an unexpected pleasure. George, will you put the kettle on?’
‘I’m just going to get Bea some toast. She hasn’t actually had breakfast, silly girl. She wanted to show me something in the window of Harcourts. For a Halloween costume,’ said George, airily. He disappeared into the tiny galley kitchen at the back of the house, calling out, ‘Marmite, Bea?’
‘Great, thanks,’ said Bea, following him. ‘I sorted out those old Girls Annuals for you, by the way,’ she called back to Frederic. ‘And the shoes, too.’
‘Wonderful. Do you want to pick something for the doll’s house?’
‘Yeah. Thanks, Frederic. Bye, Mum,’ she called, as the door banged behind her.
‘Bea,’ Juliet called after her. ‘Darling – come back for a second, would you?’
Bea’s head appeared in the stairway. ‘Yes? What?’
‘Can we talk? I want to have a word with you about something.’
‘Oh . . .’ Bea looked back up the stairs. ‘Maybe later.’
‘No . . .’ Juliet went over to the stairwell. She put her hand tentatively on her daughter’s arm. ‘Now.’
They walked along the path by the rushing stream that skirted the edge of the village, fringed by a tangled cloud of old man’s beard studded with orange and jewel-red rosehips. Behind them, the smoke rose gently from the low long rows of cottages that made up the village, silver and warm in the grey autumn sun. Juliet shoved her hands into her pockets: there was, for the first time, a chill in the air. She stared at the cottages, at the birds flying over the woods high up on the other side of the valley. ‘I wanted to ask you about Fin. Dad told me last night she was your girlfriend.’
Bea froze. Only her eyes, darting from side to side like a cornered animal.
‘He told you that.’
‘Yes, darling.’
‘What did you say?’
Juliet took a long breath, exhaling as gently, as slowly, as she could. She put her arm round Bea’s narrow shoulders, to pull her towards her, but didn’t look at her. They kept walking. ‘Well I wanted to talk to you about it.’ She could feel her daughter’s panic, almost like radiowaves, coming towards her. She squeezed her shoulder with her fingers, gently, knowing she could not crowd her. ‘I wanted to know if you want to ask her to come down for the weekend.’
‘Oh.’
‘Or if you need to go and see her in London. Whatever works. But you must let me know.’
Bea’s head was bowed. ‘Dad said you’d be upset. He said I mustn’t tell you.’
Juliet sucked her lips in, buying time, trying to stop herself saying something she shouldn’t. ‘Oh. Did he?’
‘He – he thought it might just be a thing. He said I was only fourteen and I should wait and see how I feel. But I’ve always felt like this. I don’t even hate boys. I like them. I just don’t ever want to kiss one.’
Juliet tried breathing slowly again. She found she couldn’t. But as carefully as she could she said, ‘That’s good you know you like girls. Daddy’s wrong. I’m not upset. I’m upset I didn’t realise.’ She stopped. ‘I’m very proud of you, Bea. Do you want me to make a speech? Say something official?’
‘Mum – oh my God, Mum, please don’t.’
‘I thought so.’ Juliet stopped and turned to face her daughter. ‘Listen to me. I should have realised. I felt I was losing you before the summer. I would have done anything to change that. To make you feel better.’
‘You did,’ Bea said simply.
‘But I should have asked myself what else was going on. Is that what the bullying was about? That yo
u’d come out?’
Bea stared up at a skein of birds, flying south, away from the hills towards their house, black pintucks in a puffy grey sky. ‘But I didn’t, really. It was just Fin and I started having feelings for each other and we kissed one time. But then everyone found out and started sending these messages. We never made some big declaration. But they’d been after me before that. It’s like that was another stick they could use to beat me. And Fin and I were arguing, I was sure but she wasn’t, she likes this boy, Frank, but I knew I didn’t like boys and it all . . . you know . . . I didn’t really care what happened to me to be honest.’ Bea’s voice was dull. ‘Cos I just couldn’t stand it any more, with you and Dad hating each other and the kicking and taking my bag, and making me feel crap—’
‘Oh, Bea.’
‘Then I found out about Tess and then there was this idea of coming here and I thought it’d be for the best, you know. But then we got here and I panicked. I was sure it was a mistake. You always make out everything’s for the best, and it means I don’t trust you, sometimes, Mum. Because sometimes it’s not for the best.’
The sky was clearing over to the north. Juliet stared up, at the golden break in the cloud.
‘I’m still not sure yet whether we did the right thing, moving. I hope we did, that we can all be really happy here.’ She pulled the collar of her jacket up around her, and tugged at her daughter’s denim jacket, doing the same. ‘I get things wrong. But I’m trying to do what’s best for you. To protect you.’ She kissed Bea, very gently, on the forehead. ‘Tell me about Fin, then.’
Bea tugged at the fastened button. ‘Well, she’s got cool short thick brown hair and she dyed it pink this summer. I’ve seen photos. She really likes Kate Bush, Mum, do you know her?’
‘Er, yes.’
‘OK, well she gave me a T-shirt of her before the holidays. Fin says she’s the greatest singer-songwriter this country’s produced.’
‘I like this girl.’
‘You would like her, Mum, she’s really funny. And clever, and interesting. And she’s into stuff, you know? Like, she loves dragons. Loves them. And she likes me telling her about the doll’s house, and the history. All the other girls at school, they were into their hair and their phones. Or what their boyfriend thinks or what their other friends think. Like, who cares?’
‘Who cares?’
‘So you’re not cross?’
Juliet resolved that she would never throw what he’d told Bea back at Matt. That she would do her best by her children and help them love their dad. But that some time, some day, she would make him pay for what he’d done, to this lovely, anxious, passionate, kooky girl in front of her. I burn with rage for you, she thought, looking at Bea.
‘I’m not cross.’ She tested her own feelings gingerly like probing a sore tooth. ‘I don’t think it’s that big a deal.’ She squeezed her daughter’s thin shoulders. ‘Don’t get me wrong, realising you are, and then actually saying out loud, “I am gay”, must have felt like a huge deal. But when I hear you say it, knowing you . . .’ She stopped, for suddenly her heart was flooded with love, so powerful she could not speak. She thought of Bea’s baby feet, so slender, not chubby at all, and her first scraped knee, the spongy bloodied patch of skin, of her story about the chimney sweep girl that had won her a special Gold Star at school . . . of how she held hands with people at playtime until she was eight or nine, how she rarely cried, even with that knee, but turned white and pinched, how she loved fruit, and hated cooked vegetables, loved sitting very still with her feet tucked underneath her . . . All the things that made her . . . Juliet struggled to find something to say to convey this love. She wanted to squeeze her tightly, so tight it hurt. Her heart ached. ‘All I want to say is it feels to me like just one part of who you are. A very important part, but it doesn’t change you for me. I am so proud of you and happy you know this about yourself. Does that make sense?’ She was shaking her head, smiling through the tears brimming in her eyes. ‘I’m hopeless.’
‘You’re not. It’s OK, Mum.’
‘Anyway. Yeah. I love you, my love. Fin sounds great. Let’s invite her down.’
‘Yes, Mum, oh yes please.’ Bea’s eyes shone, and she slipped her arm through Juliet’s, as they turned back towards the village, and the bridge that led on to the single-track street behind Frederic’s shop. ‘I’m so relieved. Dad said you wouldn’t be happy.’
‘Dad’s wrong sometimes, darling. I’m very happy. You’ve always made me happy.’
‘How often does Bea come here?’ Juliet asked, after Bea had disappeared back upstairs to see George.
Frederic was in the back of the shop in the office, sorting through old box files, his glasses perched on the end of his nose. He indicated an old mahogany dining chair, and Juliet sank gratefully onto it. Her legs were feeling rather cotton-wool-ish. She stared around her, at the decades-old paperwork, the postcards stuck into the cork tiles lining the small section of wall.
‘Most days after school. She does her homework here. George feeds her.’
Juliet took off her coat. ‘I know nothing about my daughter, it turns out. She said she was having a snack at school and cycling straight home.’
Frederic said in his quiet, even voice, ‘Dear Juliet. We adore having Bea here. You know, she is very like your grandmother. So fresh, and alive, so passionate. With those dark eyes just like Stella’s. It is an absolute tonic – why are you crying?’
Juliet pressed her hands into her eyes. ‘Frederic, I’m screwing everything up.’ She found she couldn’t stop herself. Tears rolled down her cheeks. ‘I didn’t know she was gay. You did, didn’t you?’
Frederic took a sip of tea. ‘You didn’t?’
Juliet’s voice was muffled. ‘She tells you and George, she told her father . . . I hadn’t twigged, and I’m the one who spends hours awake at night trying to work out what to do to make her happy.’
‘I apologise for not telling you myself.’
‘Matt told me.’ Juliet gritted her teeth. ‘Grandi, oh, you were right about him, you were right . . . He told her it might be a phase. Can you imagine that?’
Frederic nodded. ‘I can, for it happened to me, with my first lover. My mother said my father would die of shame were he to find out.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘It is of no matter. Except that – but that, my dear, is une histoire for another day.’
The shop door swung open, the bell clanging. A customer came in, a middle-aged woman with a basket on her arm. Frederic nodded politely to her.
Juliet pulled at the string of her green bag, and said under her breath: ‘I don’t know anything any more. Literally nothing.’
‘There is liberation in that.’
‘Goodness,’ said Juliet. ‘Perhaps there is.’
The sound of laughter came floating down to them. ‘George is wonderful,’ said Juliet. ‘He fixed her bike last week, did you know? Of course you did. And Frederic, the office chair is perfect in the Dovecote. And my new old bed – thank you so much, again. It’s bliss. What did I do to deserve you two in our lives?’
Frederic said, very seriously, ‘I am not so sure you can say that.’
‘I can.’
The customer was poking around in the tray of Victorian glazed tiles. Juliet was still. She could hear the sound of magpies, chattering on the branches of a rowan tree outside the shop. There was the gentle creaking of the floorboards upstairs, the low hum of voices.
For the first time in a very long while, longer than she could remember – before she had come back, before having children, before meeting Matt; for the first time since she was a teenager perhaps, sitting at the bottom of the garden at Nightingale House, wiggling her toes and watching dragonflies circle the stream, the heat of summer sun, the smell of ripening apples and honeysuckles, Ev’s humming faint as he climbed a nearby tree – Juliet felt calm. At peace.
She said:
‘If I ask you something, Frederic, will you promise
you’ll tell me the truth?’
The clear blue eyes looked steadily at her.
‘My dear, of course. Do you trust me so little?’
‘I knew I’d seen George somewhere before, you see.’
‘Ah.’ Frederic slowly shut the box file.
‘He was there on the day of the auction, wasn’t he? Did you send him? Did . . . did you know about the painting?’
Frederic leaned heavily against the shelves. ‘Well, well. Yes, my dear. I thought you might recognise me, so I sent him. We felt one of us had to be there, since I was the one selling it . . .’
Juliet blinked. ‘You sold it? It – she left it to you? Or – the house?’ But he was shaking his head. ‘They were renting it, the Walkers. I know they were. So someone still owned it before it was given to me. She left you the house and the sketch?’
‘No.’ He gave a small sigh. ‘Not really. We had an agreement. She left the sketch and the house to me, and I rented the latter out to the Walkers after she died. I arranged it all. The rent was my income for many years. So very generous of her. When the tenants decided to leave, or I decided the time was right for them to leave, the rental income would have stopped. Your grandmother planned that I was then to put the sketch up for sale, and give you the keys to the house the very same day it sold with that letter. She sat at that desk day after day writing it all out, the letter, the notes . . . Oh, she thought it all out, you see.’ His eyes twinkled. ‘The sale would make me some money for my old age, this shop not really providing much in the way of pension, and the house would then pass to you. I am not sure I didn’t get the better end of that bargain, but it is what she wanted. I gave the Walkers notice when I saw the house was getting too much for them. Besides, I am getting old, too. And I wondered about you – your parents sometimes seemed to hint all was not well, so –’ He said, solemnly, ‘Ah, Juliet. It must be a shock – I am sorry.’
‘It’s not a shock, precisely . . .’ Juliet laced her fingers together, trying to find the right next question to ask. ‘Why not just leave it to me when she died?’
The Garden of Lost and Found Page 22