A Midwinter Promise

by Lulu Taylor

  ‘I have no idea,’ Alex would reply. ‘I can just sense it. It’s an aura around her that changes when she’s angry or upset. The mystery to me is why you can’t feel it when it’s so bloody obvious.’

  Now he said, ‘What do you think the problem is?’

  ‘I think it might have something to do with Mundo. Sally and I have actually been getting on quite well. But Mundo’s been banging on about seeing you and me together; maybe he’s been complaining about us to her and it’s had an effect. I’ve been so busy I haven’t sorted it out. Sally told me he’s commuting up and down to London in any case.’

  ‘Why does he want to see us?’

  ‘The assets, Sally’s future, inheritance. Typical Mundo concerns.’

  Johnnie frowned. ‘Right. I don’t like the sound of that very much.’

  ‘He came round to the Old Barn hoping to ambush us but you were out. I don’t think he left very happy with me. Then Sally wouldn’t let me in.’

  Johnnie heard the note in his sister’s voice that meant she felt panicked and under attack. It always happened when Sally turned on her for no obvious reason, leaving her flummoxed and trying to work out what she had done to offend.

  Alex went on: ‘I was thinking about it all yesterday, and then I was at Tawray and—’

  Johnnie was surprised. ‘You were at Tawray? Why?’

  ‘The new owner has agreed to do the Christmas flowers. And I suddenly felt it all coming back and that maybe Sally wasn’t going to let us be with Pa and he might die without us there and—’

  He heard the rising note of anxiety in her voice and put his hand out to her. ‘Hey, calm down, it’s okay. I can see you’re worried, but what would Sally gain from shutting you out?’

  ‘I know. She’s been desperate to have me around up until now. She seems to think I’m the only one who understands what she’s going through and who cares about Pa as much as she does. The nurse is fine, but she’s strictly professional and when she’s not on duty, she goes up to her room and watches telly. Sally’s been lonely.’

  Johnnie sipped his drink. ‘But she’s got her little friend with her now, hasn’t she?’

  Alex nodded. ‘Mundo.’

  Johnnie leaned towards her, lifting his shoulders in confusion. ‘I mean, what’s all this about assets and inheritance? The will is the will, it’s all decided now. Until Pa actually dies, we have no idea what’s in it. Sally is probably the only one who has a clue, if she and Pa even discussed it.’

  ‘I just assumed everything would go to Sally, with maybe a bequest or some mementoes for us and the grandchildren. And Mundo too.’

  ‘Yes. I don’t like it.’ Johnnie frowned. ‘I agree with you, something’s up.’

  ‘What can we do?’

  ‘See Mundo? Hear what he’s got to say?’

  Alex looked pensive. ‘I suppose that’s all we can do. And I’ll keep the pressure up on Sally – text her, call round. Are you going over?’

  ‘I planned to take the children and Netta over tomorrow. They haven’t seen Pa yet.’

  They were both silent for a moment, thinking about how Sally might react to having three noisy boys in her well-ordered house, with Pa lying there ill.

  ‘I could take Bertie for the morning, if you like,’ Alex suggested. ‘It might be easier if it’s just the four of you the first time. Sally might work herself up into a bit of a state otherwise.’

  Johnnie nodded. ‘You’re right. Well, if you could, that would be great. He’s perfectly easy if you know how to deal with him. I hate the way Sally acts like he’s about to murder her, or destroy the house, or both.’

  Alex’s gaze had slid away and she was staring across the pub, through the mass of bodies. Johnnie followed her gaze but couldn’t see what she was looking at. She went completely still, then suddenly leapt to her feet and marched away, pushing through the crowd.

  ‘Alex! Where are you going?’ He got up to follow her, and saw that she was standing over a table on the other side of the room where two people were sitting. As he got closer, he saw that one of them was a petite blonde woman and the other his former brother-in-law.

  ‘What the hell are you doing here, Tim?’ Alex was exclaiming as he neared. ‘Why aren’t you at home with the girls?’

  ‘They’re perfectly all right,’ Tim replied, but he looked defensive. ‘They were fine with us going out. The woman next door is sitting with them while they watch telly.’

  ‘That’s not what we agreed! You shouldn’t leave them with someone I don’t know!’

  ‘She’s my neighbour, she’s completely reliable.’

  ‘That’s not the point! They shouldn’t be on their own with a virtual stranger, not with everything they’re going through right now with Pa so ill! He could die any minute.’

  ‘Don’t play that card, Alex,’ Tim said in a bored tone. ‘They’re fine. They know how to call me if there’s a problem.’

  Johnnie had reached them now, and he could see that Alex was white with fury, her eyes blazing. Tim looked up at him.

  ‘Hi there, Johnnie, how are you?’

  ‘Fine.’ He turned to his sister. ‘Al, are you okay?’

  ‘No! I’m furious!’ she snapped.

  ‘For crying out loud.’ Tim rolled his eyes. ‘It’s a storm in a teacup.’

  ‘That’s what you think!’ Alex shouted. ‘It’s actually really important to me. You said you would look after them, and you’re in the pub! With . . .’ – she shot a scornful glance at the woman, who’d sat watching silently – ‘. . . her.’

  ‘Excuse me, I do have a name!’ Chloe said indignantly but Alex ignored her.

  ‘It’s not just that you’re not looking after them,’ Alex said, dropping her voice but retaining her tone of outrage. ‘They’re your daughters, it’s your night to be with them. You only see them three nights a week. Why the hell would you rather be in a pub with your girlfriend than spending time with Scarlett and Jasmine?’ Her eyes filled with tears and she looked on the brink of weeping. ‘Why wouldn’t you want to be with them?’

  ‘He sees them plenty!’ Chloe remarked.

  ‘Shut up,’ hissed Alex, turning furious eyes on her. ‘This has nothing to do with you!’

  Johnnie took her arm. He could see that she was on the edge of losing it. ‘Come on, Alex, leave it now.’

  She shook him off. ‘I will not leave it! I’m not going away quietly, knowing that my girls are alone with a stranger in his house! Jasmine is only five!’

  ‘They’re fine!’ Tim said loudly. ‘They’re absolutely fine. Do you honestly think I’d leave them if I thought they’d be in danger?’ He picked up his glass and drained it. ‘Look, we’ll go home if it will make you feel better. We only popped out for half an hour anyway.’

  Alex couldn’t speak, almost choking on her outrage.

  ‘Come on, come on.’ Johnnie pulled her gently away. ‘Leave him.’

  Back at their table, Alex was shaking and furious, stammering out her anger at Tim.

  Johnnie put a hand on her arm. ‘Look, it’s just possible that you’re overreacting a tiny bit. I know he shouldn’t have left them, but he’s right, they’re more than likely fine, watching some telly and perfectly happy.’

  ‘It’s not just that!’ Alex said, pulling out a tissue and wiping her eyes. She looked over at her brother, agonised. ‘Don’t you understand? I can’t bear it happening to them too!’

  ‘What happening?’

  ‘Their father . . . their father rejecting them, because he’s got someone.’

  ‘Oh.’ Johnnie looked at her, understanding. When she saw Tim and Chloe, she also saw Pa and Sally. When Tim chose to leave the girls in order to spend time with Chloe, Alex felt the same pain she had when Pa chose Sally over her. Johnnie had seen it so often when they were growing up: Alex begging for Pa’s attention only to find that he was focused on Sally instead. There had been school plays and concerts he hadn’t turned up for because it clashed with Sally’s bridge tournam
ent or her charity gala. He hadn’t gone to Alex’s graduation because Sally had been ill that day and didn’t want to be left alone. And Pa hadn’t even walked her up the aisle at her wedding. Johnnie felt a sudden rush of anger, but instead of being directed at Sally, as it usually was, it was for Pa. Why did you always, always let her down? No wonder she feels so desperate when she thinks Tim’s doing the same. The outrage she felt was a manifestation of the raw rejection she’d been dealing with all her life. He grabbed her hand and said, ‘I get that, Alex, I really do. You were shoddily treated. Pa did that. I’m sorry.’

  Alex hardly seemed to hear him. ‘I can’t bear it. This whole thing – Pa so ill, the girls being abandoned . . .’ She blew her nose. ‘I just don’t understand why it all seems to be starting again.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘You know what I mean, Johnnie! The pain. The pain of all of it. Mum. Pa. Sally.’ She seemed to stumble as she said, ‘And Mundo.’ She stared at Johnnie, agonised. ‘All of it.’

  Johnnie stared back, everything churning inside him. ‘Yes. That’s why we need to find out the truth about Mum. It’s the only way to understand it.’

  ‘Is it too late?’ she asked, her eyes red. ‘What if Pa never comes back, and can never tell us?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ He shook his head and smiled wanly. ‘I guess he just has to get better.’

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  1989

  Julia stared with joy at a row of three big green plastic tubs that sat in the corner of the kitchen garden, tucked against the warm brick wall.

  ‘That’s fantastic. How does it work, Colin?’

  ‘It’s very simple, but you have to keep your ingredients right, or it won’t the do the job.’ Colin, who had worked in the gardens at Tawray for years, as a boy helping his father and now as a man, had become her partner in crime. She loved his broad Cornish burr and the way he seemed to know everything about gardening. She was also glad he seemed to want to pass his knowledge on to her. Colin lifted the black lid off the top of one of the tubs and looked into its insides. ‘You want to put in your organic matter – kitchen waste of all kinds except meat, your weeds, leaves and grass clippings – and you also need a bit of roughage and something dry, like old newspaper and cardboard. You can add coffee grinds if you’ve got them. Stick it all in the top and wait. You’ll have to wait a while at first, but then you’ll soon have a good supply of compost you can take out of the bottom, you see? And you can keep the three of them running on rotation, so as you empty the third one, the first should be about ready again.’ He smiled at her, pushing his hat back on his head. ‘It’s satisfying when you get them all going right. These tubs will keep your flowers and veggies going beautifully.’

  ‘That sounds marvellous.’ Julia peered inside the nearest tub but there was nothing within that gave any indication that it was anything more than a big container. ‘How does it turn into compost, though?’

  ‘It’s mostly because the heat increases in here, through the plastic, and speeds up the rot. And if it’s not too hot, you get your worms as well, squeezing it through their bellies and making it all rich and lovely.’

  ‘Rich and lovely.’ She savoured the words.

  ‘The plants love it, it feeds them. It’s wonderful for them here – the air is full of minerals from the sea.’ Colin grinned. ‘Bring back some seaweed from the beach when you go down, and chuck that in the tubs as well. You’ll make it really special then.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ Julia said, then her eye was caught by a movement over by the artichoke patch. ‘Whoops, there goes Johnnie!’

  She raced over and swooped him up from where he was about to stumble into the tall plants, and kissed him. ‘You’re filthy, aren’t you? Have you been eating soil again?’

  Johnnie babbled about the garden and showed her his dirty hands. Soil was smeared across his face and sat in lumps in the soft strands of his fair hair.

  ‘Never mind,’ Julia said, bouncing him onto her hip. ‘We’ll clean you up inside.’ She caught a glimpse of the time on her watch. ‘Crumbs, I had no idea it was so late. Colin, I have to go in! I’ll come back tomorrow. I’m going to be busy with a guest for now.’

  ‘Right you are,’ Colin replied, untroubled. ‘Whenever is fine.’

  Julia pulled Johnnie to her and headed back to the house, checking on the progress of everything as she went. The rhythms of the garden suited her, she found. Things had to be done, there was plenty to keep her busy, but the needs of plants were fairly slow. What couldn’t be done today could be done tomorrow or even at the end of the week, and it would all still be all right. It balanced her, knowing that this calmer, more sedate state of affairs existed alongside Johnnie’s intense schedule. He needed to be fed and looked after constantly, and if his needs weren’t answered, it could be disastrous. She knew well the frantic screams of a boy hungry for his dinner which was not ready. And David’s work life moved at a similarly frantic pace, hours and minutes accounted for and considered vital to the smooth running of operations. Julia felt it too, when he told her about his day. They’d recently had a car phone put into his Vauxhall, and he phoned her from it at odd moments when he was stuck behind a parade in Horse Guards or in the knots of traffic in Hyde Park. Just hearing about what he was doing and would do in the course of a day put knots in her stomach.

  She’d stumbled by accident on gardening as a way to counter her anxiety and to repel that great invisible hand at her back pushing her through life and into the dark. She and Johnnie had been outside so that he could get some fresh air – he’d just started walking, and his snail’s pace meant she had time to look – really look – at what was going on around her. Then she got talking to Colin when he was mulching the roses and the next moment she was helping him.

  Before long, she was out there whenever possible, sometimes with Johnnie and at other times without him, when he was napping inside. She felt certain that it was going to help in the next stage of her life, the one she had been preparing for over the course of a couple of months now.

  It was almost pleasant to be out of the warm May sunshine and in the cool of the house, Johnnie babbling away on her hip as she went to the kitchen. Mrs Petheridge had put out Johnnie’s lunch on his plastic plate, and Julia slipped him into the highchair and tied on his bib.

  ‘Is this the chicken casserole I made last week, Jackie?’ she asked.

  Mrs Petheridge nodded. ‘Yes, it is. And very nice it smells too. Your lunch is ready as well. I’ve laid it in the morning room like you asked.’

  ‘Thanks. How was the asparagus?’

  ‘The best I’ve seen for a while.’

  ‘Oh good.’ Julia was pleased. She had grown it herself under Colin’s direction and Mrs Petheridge had promised to make it into the most delicious quiche. She started feeding Johnnie. ‘And is the guest room ready?’

  ‘Yes, it is. All done.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  The next moment, as Johnnie chomped down another spoonful of his lunch, she heard the doorbell chime loudly. She put down the spoon. ‘Would you mind taking over? I’ll be back in a second.’

  Hurrying to the front door, she threw it open and there on the doorstep stood Sally, pretty and fresh in a pink and white checked sundress and white-framed sunglasses, her fair hair loose around her shoulders.

  ‘Julia!’ she cried and they hugged. ‘I’m so happy to see you!’

  ‘Me too. Come in!’ Julia’s gaze slid downwards to the unmistakable bulge in the front of Sally’s dress. ‘Oh!’ She looked up at her friend, astonished. ‘Sally, are you pregnant?’

  Sally took off her sunglasses, looking sheepish. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘I should have said. I . . .’ Her cheeks became stained the same colour pink as the squares on her dress: rosy and demure. ‘I just . . . I didn’t quite know what to say.’

  Julia led her into the hall. ‘Not because of me, I hope! You know I have no problem at all with pregnancy.’

  ‘Well . . .’ Sall
y’s gaze slid away again and she looked more embarrassed. ‘It was partly that. And partly because . . . obviously . . . I’m not married.’

  Julia burst out laughing. ‘Oh Sally, as if that would bother me! I don’t mind in the least! Have you had some stick for it? I’m sorry if you have. Wait, let’s go and see Johnnie, and then I want to hear all about it. You are a dark horse, though. Fancy not saying anything! I’m almost offended.’

  They went through to coo over Johnnie and Julia finished giving him his lunch. They didn’t talk about Sally’s pregnancy in front of Mrs Petheridge, but once Johnnie had been put down for his lunchtime nap and they were on their own in the morning room with their lunch, Julia said, ‘Well, I think you’d better tell me all about it. Is it Arthur’s baby?’

  Arthur had been Sally’s boyfriend for two years now, and Julia had been expecting to hear any day that Sally and he were engaged.

  Sally pushed some asparagus quiche around the plate with her fork before saying quietly, ‘Arthur isn’t going to have anything to do with the baby. We’ve finished, you see. We finished before I knew I was pregnant.’

  ‘Oh Sally! I’m sorry.’ Julia felt dreadful. This was not what she’d been expecting. ‘But shouldn’t you tell him? Doesn’t he want to be involved?’

  ‘He doesn’t want to be involved in the slightest. He’s not interested.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Absolutely certain. So I made up my mind to do this without him.’ Sally looked suddenly defiant. ‘My parents wanted me to get rid of it, of course. My mother was quite horrible and said I’d never get a husband if I had another man’s baby – used goods and all that – and my father said no one wanted a cuckoo in the nest. But I can’t do it, Julia. I’ve always wanted a baby and I just can’t kill this one because I’m not married to the father. The way I see it, Arthur and I would have split up at some point in any case, so I’m sparing the baby that experience. I think divorce is a lot more painful than simply not knowing one’s father. So I’m doing it alone.’

  ‘You’re so brave. And you look marvellous. You’re glowing,’ Julia said, her voice heartfelt. ‘I’m delighted for you, if this is what you want.’