by Rebecca Tope
She went home at seven, after supper with Angie and Russell. There had been almost no meaningful conversation, with Simmy oddly reluctant to reveal the reappearance of her former husband. Until she knew more about the story, it felt ill-advised to talk about it. There would be too many old memories, questions and painful emotion. Her parents had been unusually forbearing over the separation and subsequent divorce, offering support and sympathy, and making very little by way of judgemental comment. The sadness of the lost baby made them quiet.
The drive up to Troutbeck saw all Simmy’s thoughts redirected to her increasingly significant new relationship. Christopher’s auction would have finished by five, but he would be too tired to trek down to Troutbeck for the night. His voice would be hoarse, throat dry and head whirling. There had been one occasion when his ardour overcame exhaustion, but it had been a poor business. ‘I should have pushed that Russian icon higher. I was too quick to bring the hammer down. The vendor’s going to be furious.’ And with many similar worries arising from a prolonged post-mortem on the day, Simmy had come close to sending him home again.
She was content to end the day alone. There was a double lump inside somewhere, caused by her mother-in-law’s letter, and the absence of any message from Staveley. Insoluble worries that required her to simply wait for what happened next. Another lump lurked deeper, due to the imminence of Mother’s Day. How many times had she kicked herself for failing to anticipate the pain and resentment that this was going to inflict on her in her capacity as a florist? She’d been fine with Valentine’s, and weddings and funerals and even christenings. In her plans for the business, all these had been a natural part of her thinking. But her foolish mind had simply blanked the big one. She found herself half expecting that some understanding deity would cancel the whole thing, just for her. She witnessed the endless stream of dutiful adult sons and embarrassed teenaged ones going through the motions of buying flowers for a mother with whom they had their own unique relationship. A relationship that worked well enough without following a script imposed from outside. A collective idiocy was lying just beneath the surface, despite a wholesale pretence that all was sincere and enjoyable. The mothers themselves pretended hardest of all. Yes, they’d endured the pangs of childbirth, and done years of dirty work on bottoms and snotty noses, and worried over the late homecomings. But they’d done it willingly, taken pleasure from it, and now had at least the hope of a safety net in old age.
Melanie Todd, Simmy’s first assistant in the shop, had taken her to task over this sort of thinking. ‘You’ve got it all wrong,’ she said. ‘They need this special day to shore up the whole business. The mothers have to be convinced that their kids aren’t going to abandon them to an old folks’ home. They have to be told they didn’t waste the best years of their lives. I can see that it’s horrible for you, because of your baby, but it’s nice for most people, Simmy. Like Christmas and birthdays. People like to feel special, and loved. Don’t be such a curmudgeon about it.’
Simmy did try, that first year, with Melanie keeping her on track. She smiled and gushed and listened to the stories of maternal heroism, before taking her own mother a modest bouquet, and a rueful smile. ‘I could hardly not,’ she said.
Angie had been equally rueful, and not at all gracious. ‘Thanks. But don’t do it again, okay? Just take the money and try not to think about it.’
All of which led to agonisingly complicated feelings this year. If she could simply follow Angie’s line, hating the whole silly business, it would be easier. But she could not sustain such a level of cynicism. Persimmon Straw had been born with most of the softer virtues, and only the constant exposure to her mother’s world view had shown her that you sometimes had to be hard or selfish in order to survive. She sometimes thought this made her a moral coward; all her instincts being to withdraw and ignore the harsher side of life.
Christopher was even more exhausted than usual when she put in her nightly phone call. ‘We didn’t finish till nearly six,’ he moaned.
They could find little to say, twenty-four hours after their last exchange. Plans were made for the Grasmere trip, with hopes for the weather buoyed by a favourable forecast. Logistics occupied a few minutes – should they go separately, or should he come to Troutbeck and collect her? Was he going to stay over on Sunday night?
All was decided, and Simmy began to prepare for bed. Then the landline trilled.
‘Simmy? Did you get my letter? I thought I should follow it up with a call, now I’ve finally found your number. I’m sorry it’s a bit late, but you were engaged when I tried before.’
‘Pam,’ said Simmy weakly. ‘Yes, I got your letter.’
Chapter Five
It was unwelcome and weird to hear the woman’s voice again. They had been close for ten years, pleased with the way they managed the relationship. Sometimes Tony complained that he was just an incidental element. His father, present in the flesh, but hopelessly distracted by his passion for old cars and the history of the Second World War, was nobody’s best friend or significant other. He had begun to slide into premature old age, reaching the age of seventy as if it was ninety.
Pamela had two other sons, having always wanted girls. She had seized on Simmy as a gift from heaven. Another daughter-in-law had taken against her from the outset, remaining hostile and spiky for the rather brief duration of her marriage to Daniel. Richard, the middle son, never once presented a girlfriend to the family, leaving them to slowly conclude that there was no place for women in his life.
‘I want to make it very clear that I’m not blaming you in the least,’ said Pamela Brown now. ‘I’m not defending Tony for his behaviour. At least, I suppose I am in a way, because I think it’s down to his mental state. He would never have done such stupid things if he’d been in his right mind.’
Simmy had heard similar sentiments before. The umbrella excuse for a large proportion of criminal acts – he wasn’t responsible. His reason had deserted him. He didn’t know what he was doing.
‘It came as a shock,’ she said. ‘I had no idea he’d even been injured.’
‘I’m sorry. It never occurred to me that you wouldn’t know about it, until I realised there might not be anyone still in touch with you both. Foolish of me.’ The voice tailed away and Simmy had to acknowledge that the woman had good reason to be distressed. ‘I suppose I hoped that there would be at least some contact between the two of you. After all, you were a close couple for a long time.’
Simmy made no attempt to explain her marriage breakdown. She had barely managed to explain it to herself, and any words she found to summarise what had happened always felt inadequate. It was all about failure and cowardice and the bottom falling out. ‘I can’t see why I should be involved with the trial or whatever it is,’ she said. ‘What do they want me to say?’
‘I know. It was all the idea of his defence barrister. Human interest, gaining sympathy and that sort of thing. It’s probably clutching at straws, but, well …’
‘It must be awful for you. They’re not keeping him in custody or anything, are they?’
‘No, no, not at all. For months, he was absolutely the victim. The woman stabbed him. Then everything turned around, and she accused him of aggravated harassment, or whatever they call it, and he had to defend himself. She’s gone public on how he ruined her life for years, until she couldn’t take any more.’
‘Is she allowed to do that? Isn’t it sub judice?’
‘I’m not sure any of that works any more. People seem to be able to say anything they like on Facebook and all that sort of thing.’
‘What a mess,’ sighed Simmy. ‘But as you say, she caused him actual injury. That must be far more serious than anything Tony did. Is he completely recovered now? How bad was it?’
She couldn’t avoid a mental image of her former husband’s naked body: his smooth pale skin with a ragged scar on it, vulnerable and spoilt. Tony had always been slim, hairless, his muscles soft and inconspicuous. H
is weakness, previously accepted as part of his nature, had forced itself unpleasantly onto her when Edith died, and now, apparently, it had afflicted another woman, who surely had not deserved it.
‘His lung won’t ever be the same, but it’s not life-threatening. Do you remember this woman at all?’
‘Well, sort of. There were three or four of them, all silent and sympathetic, and I didn’t really focus on one in particular. I could hear another woman giving birth in the next room, everybody shouting at her to push, but with me they just let it happen at its own pace. No worries about getting the baby breathing, you see. And I had the feeling they were hanging back from me, because they didn’t quite know what to say. I didn’t blame them.’
‘Tony says she held his hand. Do you remember that?’
‘Not really. He cried a lot. Somebody rubbed his back. That was probably her. She was quite big and solid. A nice soft bosom. But most of them are like that, aren’t they?’
Pamela gave a little laugh. ‘They do seem to be, yes. It’s nice to talk to you, after all this time. I’ve missed you, you know.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Simmy, thinking at that moment that it really was all her fault. Then something more assertive kicked in, and she physically drew back, pulling the phone away from her head. She had moved past that phase of her life. Tony and the baby were firmly in the past. ‘But I’ve got things pretty well organised here now. The business suits me very nicely. My parents are glad to have me close by. And, actually, I’m in a new relationship, which feels very right. I’ve moved on, as they say.’
‘Good. That’s good. I wouldn’t wish anything less for you.’
‘Thank you, Pamela. You’re a good person. I wish …’
‘Yes. We all wish that. I’ll tell the legal people what you said, anyway. If it was down to me, I’d leave you alone, but knowing the way these things work, I’m afraid you’re quite likely to be bothered again. They’re hoping to get Tony cleared completely, you see.’
‘That’s their job, I suppose,’ said Simmy. ‘I’ll do what I can, but I don’t think it’ll be very much.’
‘We’ll see. Thank you for listening, anyway.’
The memories haunted her for the rest of the evening, and made it difficult to get to sleep. When she dreamt, it was about the fells between Troutbeck and Kentmere, with a dog finding a fresh grave, and the flowers intended for the funeral thrown into a dustbin. Her first thought when she woke on Sunday was that the Staveley people had failed in their promise to update her on Anita’s party.
She and Christopher spent the whole of Sunday together, slipping into their customary topics of conversation, rather than anything more sensitive. The auctions, the flowers, his family and her friends were enough to occupy them until well into the afternoon. The long-standing family friend in Grasmere turned out to be a wispy old man called Philip who said little as Christopher did a rapid tour of his house. His possessions amounted to little of any commercial interest, except for a handful of old model aeroplanes and an even older Persian rug. ‘I can get you a good price for them,’ said Christopher.
The old man showed no sign of offering them lunch, so they headed for a pub that neither of them had visited before. It was after one o’clock, and they were offered no alternative to a traditional roast dinner. Across the room from them was a couple with two babies. ‘Twins?’ asked a passing customer.
‘Right,’ said the father. ‘A bit more than we bargained for.’ All those in earshot laughed sympathetically.
Christopher and Simmy could not evade the domesticity all around them. This was an English Sunday – people eating roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, a woman with her dog in a corner, chatter and muted music forming the background ambience. ‘How are your mum and dad?’ he asked her.
‘Same as usual, pretty much. They’re worried about the busy season, I think. My mother’s going to have to change the way she does it, which she’s not happy about. I think it’ll spoil it for her, actually. I wouldn’t be surprised if this is their last year.’
‘And then what? Would they sell the house and downsize?’
‘I have no idea. That never crossed my mind.’ Her breathing grew faster and more shallow. ‘It panics me to think of it,’ she admitted.
‘Why? They can’t go on indefinitely, can they?’
‘She’s not even sixty-five yet. I’ve been to B&Bs where the people are in their eighties.’
‘Really?’ He gave her a sceptical look. ‘They must have had some help, if so. And you said it yourself – that this might be their last year.’
‘I know I did. But I—never mind. Let’s talk about something else.’
But they seemed stuck on families, the future, passing time and fading youth. By increments they shifted from the general to the particular, leaving gaps and diverting into safer waters, but Simmy knew it was coming. When it did, she almost missed it.
‘What’re we going to do, then?’ said Christopher.
‘We could stop in Ambleside and watch the boats on the lake,’ she said, in all innocence.
‘No – I mean us. What’re we going to do?’
‘Oh.’ She looked around the bar, nervous about being overheard. ‘Not here. Not now.’ Didn’t he understand that such conversations were supposed to happen in bed, or cuddled on a sofa? It had been dawning on her for a few weeks that Christopher wasn’t very good at timing. He spoke before thinking of the likely reaction. Having known him all her early life, literally, she was gradually coming to realise that in the years since their teenage romance they had both changed considerably.
‘Sorry,’ he said, with a little frown. ‘Did I get it wrong again?’
‘A bit. I’m not fobbing you off, but we need to be somewhere private, okay?’
‘Sorry,’ he said again. ‘You’re absolutely right. I do blurt things, don’t I? Oliver told me off last week for doing the same thing. I’ve got to learn discretion, he says.’
The antiques business was, of course, notorious for secret deals, dishonest valuations, shady transactions. When Ben Harkness had become aware of Simmy’s new boyfriend’s line of work, he had been hugely excited. ‘A hotbed of crime – that’s what an auction house is,’ he cried. ‘Can I go and watch? Can I spend a day behind the scenes? Will you ask him?’
‘You haven’t got time,’ Simmy had said. ‘And I’m sure Christopher’s not involved in any sort of crime.’
But when her mother had made a similar remark, invoking the Lovejoy television series as evidence, Simmy had begun to wonder. There had to be temptations to hold back the true value of an object, or to inflate the desirability of another. She tried to suggest some of this to Christopher, half expecting him to fly into a defensive rage.
‘Not if you want to keep a good reputation,’ he told her seriously. ‘The slightest whiff of dirty dealing, and you’re sunk. However dishonest the buyers and sellers might be, the auctioneer himself has to stay right above it. We go to a lot of trouble to make sure nothing sticks to us. Obviously, there are loads of games going on. The specialists all know the precise value of every item, and make sure they don’t pay a penny over that. They all know each other, as well. But then you get somebody new turning up, and that throws everything into confusion. Is it a novice, an amateur who has no idea what’s what? Or is it someone from the other end of the country, looking for fresh pastures? New people tend to drive the prices up, and that makes the regulars cross.’
‘But not you. You want the prices as high as possible, for the commission.’
‘More or less, yes. But in the long run, it can put people off. And really, we just want everything sold.’
She had asked about ivory, and old oil paintings, and with every reply she’d found the whole business more and more fascinating. ‘You know what,’ said Ben astutely. ‘I think you’d really like to go up to Keswick and get him to give you a job. Forget flowers – antiques are loads more fun.’
That had been two weeks ago, and she had buried th
e comment as deeply as she could. The thought of selling her Troutbeck cottage, abandoning her parents, closing the florist business, all sent her blood running cold. And yet … Might she not bitterly regret missing such a chance, if Christopher lost patience with the geographical distance between them and the dithering about what happened next?
They finished their meal and wandered back to the cars. In the end, they’d decided to drive separately to Grasmere, and then both go back to Troutbeck for the evening and night. There was a spiteful east wind blowing that made the fells uninviting. ‘We could go to Ambleside for a bit,’ said Christopher with a little laugh. ‘And watch the boats on the lake.’
‘Too cold,’ she protested, shamelessly contradicting herself. ‘We need to be indoors on a day like this. Don’t forget I’m a soft southerner. It’ll take a few more years before I properly acclimatise to these winters.’
‘Wimp,’ he accused. ‘Besides, it’s not cold over here. Wet, though, I grant you, and that looks like a very purposeful black cloud over there.’
It felt strange to be driving alone, despite seeing his big Volvo in the rear mirror, following her all the way back to Troutbeck. The sense of a new chapter, an imminent decision, was sending all kinds of electricity around her frame. ‘There’s no need to be scared,’ she muttered to herself. ‘Be happy. This is what you’ve wanted for ages. This, Persimmon Straw, is what your mother always said was your destiny. Goodbye, Simmy Brown.’ She waved foolishly at the following car, unsure whether Christopher could see her, and wondering what he was thinking. Did he assume they’d get married, or was the very idea horrifying to him? Was this sudden reappearance of Tony and his mother going to taint or impede whatever it was that had developed between her and Christopher?