by Jo Verity
‘It’s feasible,’ she said.
‘Maybe,’ John said. ‘But when it boils down to it, it was your mother’s place to tell you.’
Vivian couldn’t have that. ‘She failed to tell me and then she had the nerve to die. Another black mark for Mum.’
‘I didn’t mean it like that,’ John said.
‘He made this will after my mother died, knowing I wouldn’t learn the truth until today. You think that’s acceptable? Because I don’t. It’s cowardly. Spiteful.’ She couldn’t breathe properly and she was near to tears. ‘He must really have hated me.’
As her composure slipped further she sensed the men closing ranks. Determined not to allow them the satisfaction of seeing her lose control, she excused herself and went to find Sonja Olsen.
‘All done?’ the solicitor said, looking up from her papers.
‘Not quite.’
‘Something I can help with?’
‘Did he leave anything else?’ Vivian said. ‘A letter? Or another document?’
The solicitor picked up a file from a stack on the floor. Taking out a fat manila envelope, she checked the label. ‘These are the deeds to the house in Farleigh Road.’ She peered into the file. ‘No. Nothing else here. Is something missing?’
‘The thing is,’ Vivian said, ‘the thing is, it appears that Philip Carey isn’t – wasn’t – my father.’
Sonja Olsen looked expectant, as though waiting for the punchline of a joke.
Vivian offered her the will. ‘I’d be interested in your opinion.’
From the first-floor window, she watched Balham going about its Wednesday business. A white van was parked on the pavement, two policemen talking to the driver. A mother was pushing an empty buggy and carrying a screaming toddler. A young man in shirtsleeves hurried out of Starbucks, balancing four cups in a cardboard tray. Sketchy clouds were thinning, revealing patches of blue sky. Anyone who didn’t know might think it an ordinary day.
‘Well, it would certainly seem…’ Miss Olsen broke off mid-sentence as if Vivian might find the rest of it too hurtful.
‘John thinks I’m jumping to conclusions,’ Vivian said, ‘but what with “daughter of my late wife”, and the bequest, I can’t see any other explanation.’
‘I take it you are in possession of your birth certificate?’
‘Yes. I was looking at it only a matter of days ago. Philip Carey’s definitely registered as my father.’
Sonja Olsen took refuge in the legal technicalities. ‘That proves nothing except his willingness to accept paternal responsibility. Of course there’s always the option of DNA testing if you wish to challenge—’
‘You don’t understand,’ Vivian said. ‘I spent my childhood – my whole life, in fact – wondering what I’d done to make my father dislike me. Can you imagine how that feels? How it’s affected me? Discovering he’s not my father…I don’t know…this sounds melodramatic but it’s like being reborn. Does that make sense?’
The solicitor nodded but looked uneasy.
Vivian smiled. ‘Don’t worry. I shall be fine. Honestly.’
Sonja Olsen paused for a second before resuming her mantle of professionalism. ‘Well if you do have any further questions or want to discuss anything – anything at all – please don’t hesitate to get in touch.’
When Vivian returned to the room, the men had donned their overcoats. They were doing their best to look benevolent but they resembled a couple of conspirators.
‘Any joy?’ Richard said.
‘He left no other documents, if that’s what you mean by joy,’ she said.
‘We thought we’d go back to Farleigh Road,’ John said. ‘Work out where we take it from here.’
‘Take what?’ she said. ‘I don’t want to take anything anywhere.’
Richard put a hand on her shoulder. ‘We understand how you must be feeling, Vivian.’
She took a step backwards, out of his reach. ‘In that case, you’ll understand why I shall open a bottle of champagne this evening.’
Vivian had planned to go straight to work once the business with the will was done. But that was out of the question now. Howard. Ottilie. Ralph. Wanting to know about her ‘inheritance’. Guessing how much the house might sell for. Before facing them, she must work out a strategy and, on her way to the Tube, she contacted Ottilie.
‘I have things to sort out,’ she said, which was true. ‘Tell Howard I’ll be in first thing tomorrow.’ She ended the call before Ottilie could ask any questions.
She left the crisp, bright day and descended to the platform, the elation that had kept her going for the past hour or so leaching away, leaving her drained of feeling. The overhead matrix flicked away the minutes until the next train was due and she fixed her eyes on it, waiting for some sort of emotion to engulf her as it surely must.
When the train arrived there were plenty of empty seats and she chose one mid-carriage. She seldom had the opportunity to study her fellow travellers, crammed together as they generally were in the rush hour crush, everyone resolutely minding their own business. She glanced around. On the adjacent seat, a young man flipped through a printout of a Powerpoint presentation. A job interview? Opposite, two middle-aged women, wearing too much make-up and cheap jewellery. Probably heading for Oxford Street. Standing near the door, a man in a padded coat, tracksuit bottoms and dusty, toe-capped boots with a hefty-looking toolbox on the floor between his feet. Plumber? Electrician?
Her gaze wandered from one person to another, and occasionally to her own image reflected dimly in the carriage window opposite where she sat. What did these people make of her? An unfair question when she no longer knew what to make of herself.
The train stopped at Clapham South and several passengers got on. Amongst them was a man with a child in a buggy. He sat on one of the flap-down seats near the door, manoeuvring the buggy so that it was close to him. It was stuffy in the train and the child – Vivian had no idea how old it was – one? older? – muffled in winter clothing, struggled to escape, arching its back and tugging at a red knitted hat. The hat came off came, revealing spindly plaits and hooped earrings. (A girl.) Nothingy-blue eyes. Pasty face with patches of dry skin on cheeks and chin. Crusty nostrils. A plain child.
The man unclipped the harness and scooped his daughter – it had to be his daughter – onto his knee. Steadying her with one hand, he deftly removed her coat and cardigan with the other and stowed them in the buggy, all the while murmuring reassurance. ‘There you go. How’s that? Better?’
The child stared solemnly up into his face. He bent and kissed her on her forehead, and she raised her hand and brushed his lips. He opened his mouth and she inserted her fingers and he pretended to nibble them, drawing his lips over his teeth to protect the tiny digits. Vivian expected the child to giggle or complain but instead she nestled into her father’s shoulder, her eyes fixed on his chin. He nibbled gently and soon her eyelids dipped. When it was obvious she was asleep, he removed her hand from his mouth but kept hold of it.
He must have sensed Vivian watching him from the other side of the carriage because he glanced across at her and smiled, as if they shared a secret. She smiled back, wishing that she could tell him that he was giving his plain-faced daughter a wonderful gift.
As soon as she got in, she took out the wooden box in which she kept her mother’s things. There wasn’t much. A wristwatch with a tiny face and delicate gold strap. A purse. A couple of passport photographs. An appointment diary with pathetically few entries. A pair of sunglasses. An unremarkable selection of jewellery. She’d studied these items dozens of times and knew that she wouldn’t find the answer here.
Nor did she think it – whatever form it might take – could be at Farleigh Road. She’d rifled through pretty much everything when she was there. Of course there was the possibility that he (what should she call him now?) had hidden something in the attic or beneath the floorboards. If that were the case, she would never find it because she would never go
there again.
Taking the tube of Savlon, which she’d salvaged yesterday, she dropped it in with the other things, and she was returning the box to the cupboard when it came to her. This was what he’d been trying to tell her as he lay dying in that claustrophobic room.
As a small child, she’d known that he couldn’t be her father. For one thing, she looked nothing like him. (Nor like her mother, but that relationship wasn’t in dispute.) He’d tolerated her, but hadn’t loved or even been interested in her. To be fair, he’d never abused her, unless imposing his hands-off Victorian standards and depriving her of the unconditional love to which any child was entitled could be termed abuse. She’d never confided this knowledge to a single soul. They would have thought her wicked or mad. Worse than that, it might have got back to her mother thus hurting the only person who loved her.
At some point, her child’s eye view of her situation had become less black-and-white and this conviction had been replaced by resignation and resolution to keep out of his way. On the whole this had worked but she saw now that she had simply been marking time until she could leave home and escape his grinding censure.
Although today’s disclosure didn’t excuse Philip Carey’s treatment of her, it went some way to account for it. What she didn’t understand was why, even when she was old enough to deal with it, her mother had failed to tell her the truth. John had been right, of course. She should have told her. She must have been conscious of the damaging effect his conduct was having on her daughter. The truth, no matter what it was, would have been preferable. But whatever else happened, she must keep faith with her mother. Trust that she had, for whatever reason, made a good decision in marrying – and sticking with – Philip Carey. Doubt her mother and her life would have no datum line.
She closed her eyes and cast her mind back. Maybe she’d missed something – a hint or a clue.
There had been something odd. She couldn’t recall why this had come up but, not long before her mother’s death, they’d discussed the choices available to women these days. (Career. Motherhood. Marriage. That sort of thing.) During the conversation, she’d asked her mother why she hadn’t gone back to work once she – Vivian – had started school. ‘Your father provided for us, and I looked after us. That’s how we’d agreed it would be.’
How we’d agreed it would be.
The obvious reason for an agreement between a pregnant woman and an old man was that the woman needed respectability and security, and the old man needed a housekeeper. Surely that couldn’t be it. Things like that happened in Hardy novels not in Tooting. Not in 1974. After all if her mother had felt herself incapable of raising a child alone, she had family in Germany. Single mothers wouldn’t have been that frowned upon – even in Bavaria. On top of that, to remain with this old man for thirty-odd years…
Her thoughts raced, scattering in all directions. Had her birth father been the love of her mother’s life? Or a one night stand? Darker possibilities lurked were she brave enough to go there. Rape. Incest. Human life came about as readily from acts of violence as acts of love.
She took a notebook from her bag and began jotting down thoughts and questions as they occurred to her – anything which might cast light on this revelation. It was the same notebook she’d been using in A&E, when Gil had insisted she eat his crisps.
Gil. If he were here, he’d laugh and accuse her of treating this like a forensic investigation which, of course, it was. ‘You’ll be setting up an incident room next.’ That’s what he’d say.
She put the notebook down, found her phone and scrolled through her contacts. But when Gil’s number showed on the screen, she hesitated. Tell him now and he’d offer suggestions. Solutions. He’d assume he could put himself in her place. But how could he do that when she wasn’t anywhere? She would tell him. But not yet. Not until she’d worked out where she was now and where she wanted to be.
41
According to Kevin’s big book of rules, Gil wasn’t eligible for time off to attend Carey’s funeral and he’d been forced to call in sick.
‘Don’t push your luck,’ Kevin said next morning. ‘They’ve got their eye on you. What with one thing and another.’
That was as near as Kevin ever got to a reprimand. He couldn’t handle confrontation and to avoid it he’d perfected a nod-and-wink technique. Despite having assured Gil there was no need to worry, it looked like he planned to hold the Irene Tovey business over him until it was formally settled.
Gil had several other things on his mind, one of which was the letter in his pocket. His mother had written it the day he left – around the time his plane was taking off.
Dearest Gillon,
I hope you are over your jet lag and that the weather in London has improved.
It was lovely to have you here this week. Thank you for doing all those jobs. It is such a relief not to have that tap dripping all the time.
It’s hard for teenagers to express their feelings but I know Chris and Adam liked having you around. I hope they won’t stop coming over to see me.
I think you should know Louise and Dan are going through a bumpy patch. She didn’t want to worry you with it so please don’t say anything if you speak to her. I am sure it will blow over. I was surprised when she offered to throw the party but she was determined to have a family get together. She is very fond of you, you know.
Now we have the new baby to look forward to. Me a great gran. Imagine that.
That’s all for now. Take care of yourself, won’t you? All I ever wanted was for my children to be healthy and happy.
Ever your loving Mum. xxx
What a killer.
In the course of hunting for a screwdriver, Gil arrived at the conclusion that he had too much stuff. Before he knew it, he’d filled three black bags with junk – impressive for a man who, in theory, had few possessions. The lack of clutter inspired him to give the flat a good going over. He even unearthed the spray polish he’d splashed out on when he was renovating his chair.
Cleaning occupied his time but not his thoughts. Vivian had all but ignored him after the funeral. He didn’t think she’d set out to hurt him, all the same it hadn’t been great. He could kid himself it was because she was distressed, or cross with him for dismissing her parents’ shotgun marriage as no big deal. He doubted it was either. It had been okay to take him to Friel’s party – the stand-in for the boyfriend who’d gone skiing. The bomb had still been news at the time making him something of a novelty. Now that the bomb and Mellor were history, her friends would start asking why this Aussie bloke kept showing up.
He’d seen her only twice since returning from Coffs Harbour – their walk on the Heath, and at the funeral – but that was enough to prove that they were slipping away from each other. She’d complained that he and she were floating around in a bubble. She’d wanted to ‘label’ their relationship and he’d talked her out of it. He regretted that now. It was hard to ignore something which had a name, or lose something which had a label attached to it.
Then, as he was thinking about going to bed, she rang. She had something to tell him, something she couldn’t discuss on the phone. Was he free tomorrow? Her tone was oddly upbeat for a woman whom he feared was about to dump him.
‘Why don’t you come here?’ he said. ‘I promise it’ll be tidier than last time. And warmer. If you’re good, I’ll let you choose the music.’
‘Midday?’
‘Perfect,’ he said.
He stood at the window, looking down at the street, expecting her to come round the corner. At twelve-ten, he texted her his address in case she’d forgotten. By twelve-twenty, he had her crushed beneath a bus. Then suddenly there she was, striding towards the house, carrying a bunch of flowers.
He waited until she rang the bell before going down, not wanting her to know that he’d been watching out for her.
‘Yellow for wisdom,’ she said holding out the bunch of daffodils.
She had painted her nails. Nothing out
rageous, in fact not far off their natural colour. (Polly’s nails had been dark blue. It looked as if her fingers had been crushed in a car door.) But Vivian – his Vivian – didn’t paint her nails.
He took her coat and draped it on a coat hanger, then found a jug for the flowers. Slanting sunlight fell across the freshly laundered bedspread. The room smelled of coffee and furniture polish. What with the tidy flat and the flowers, it seemed very grown up and weirdly unreal.
‘Sorry I haven’t been in touch,’ she said.
‘I expect you’ve been busy. There must be a lot to sort out.’
‘Not at all. In fact I don’t have to sort anything out.’
‘No?’ he said.
‘No. Because…’ She clapped her hands and smiled triumphantly, like a schoolgirl who’d proved the teacher wrong. ‘Philip Carey wasn’t my father.’
Before he had time to question this astonishing statement, she was telling him the story, her words spilling out in a breathless torrent. When she’d finished, she went through it again, as if a second telling made it doubly credible, this time showing him the will, running her finger along the critical words.
‘You know what this means?’ she said. ‘I never have to think about Philip Carey again. I never have to see Richard or John Carey again. Or set foot in that horrid house ever again. You can’t imagine how good that feels.’
Her cheeks were flushed and she was talking too quickly. His instinct was to try to calm her down. To hold her and stroke her as one might stroke an agitated animal. But she was so fired up she would probably freak out if he touched her.
‘When did you find out?’ he said.
‘Wednesday morning.’
‘That’s three days ago,’ he said.
‘I was going to phone you, but then I realised I have to work this thing out for myself.’
‘It’s quite something to work out,’ he said.
‘I thought so at first. But then I realised that I don’t have to work anything out. I don’t have to do anything. I don’t have to tell anyone. As far as the world’s concerned, I shall be no different.’