‘And I’m not the best thing for him?’
‘It’s not personal, dear. It’s not about your qualities as an individual.’ Elaine looked distinctly unsure about this. ‘Cam wants the firm to be a success and I’m sure you want that too. For him.’
‘I want Cam to be happy,’ Gwen said.
‘Wonderful. Then you agree. A fresh start. You’ll like that.’
‘I don’t see what is so bad about Cam being with me. Why would that affect the business? And don’t say reputation—’
‘But that’s what it comes down to. People might find your work – diverting – some people might even want to avail themselves of your services, but don’t ever mistake that for liking you.’
Gwen wasn’t going to get into a discussion about services she might or might not be providing to people. It was none of Elaine Laing’s business and countering ‘making potions’ with ‘finding lost things’ probably wasn’t going to be very convincing. Instead she said, ‘What has liking got to do with providing legal services? If you want people to like you, I’ve got to say being a lawyer is not the way forward.’
‘People trust us, though. You can dislike your lawyer, but you’ve got to trust him.’
Gwen shook her head. ‘I still don’t see what this has to do with Cam’s private relationship with me. It’s not like I’m a criminal.’
Elaine folded her hands neatly in her lap. ‘I am not going to discuss your merits as a person. This is not about you; this is about your family’s unfortunate reputation which, sadly, you are clothed in.’
‘So this isn’t because you hate me, but because you hated my aunt.’
Elaine stiffened. ‘I didn’t even know your aunt.’
‘That’s a lie.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘It’s okay. I understand, but it’s a lie and we both know it’s a lie, so can we move on?’
Elaine’s face twisted, and Gwen caught a glimpse of the anger and pain contained within Elaine’s pastel twin-set. It wasn’t pretty. ‘Iris was a witch,’ Elaine said. ‘She was an embarrassment to the community, a liability to the firm.’
‘So you’ve decided that I can’t live in End House. Because I’m related to her.’
‘You can live wherever you choose.’ Elaine’s eyes darted left as she spoke. ‘I just thought you might be more comfortable in a less quiet town. Somewhere more bohemian.’
‘But you want me out of my aunt’s house?’ The flicker of guilt behind Elaine’s eyes made Gwen realise something: Elaine had stolen the title deeds to End House. Right from the beginning, she’d wanted to get rid of her. She’d taken out insurance in case she couldn’t simply order her away like last time. Gwen hadn’t even been given a chance. ‘I know you took the title deeds,’ she said, letting the anger show in her voice.
Elaine froze, her tea cup suspended halfway to her mouth.
‘They weren’t in the file when I picked up the keys, but I didn’t really think about it until now.’
Elaine replaced the cup onto the saucer. The gentle chime of china on china rang in the sudden silence. ‘That is a very serious allegation.’
Elaine had gone very pale, and a part of Gwen almost felt sorry for her. Almost. ‘I understand that you don’t want me around and I understand that you’re desperate to protect Cam.’ Gwen took a deep breath. ‘I want to clear the air between us and, to be honest, I’ve got enough problems without worrying about you and whatever you’re planning.’
Elaine licked her lips. ‘I’m sure that we can come to some kind of arrangement. There must be something you want.’
‘I’m not leaving this time. I love it here and I love your son.’ Gwen swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat. ‘I’m not running away and I’m not Iris. I don’t know why you hated her so much, but I’m not my great-aunt. I’m not your enemy.’
Elaine looked at the floor. She was silent for so long that Gwen was beginning to wonder if this was Elaine’s way of dismissing her from the room.
Finally, she looked up. ‘It was her fault.’ Elaine was squeezing words out from behind clenched teeth. Her face was a horror mask. ‘It was her fault he died.’
‘Who? Mr Laing?’
‘Cameron’s father,’ Elaine said. ‘It was Iris Harper’s fault.’ She reached into the pocket of her cardigan and produced a handkerchief.
‘What happened?’ Gwen said. ‘I know he was very ill.’
‘Stomach cancer.’ Elaine dabbed at her eyes.
‘And Iris visited him, didn’t she?’
‘She said she could help. He trusted her.’
‘Did she say she could cure him?’
Elaine’s face twisted again. ‘No.’
‘And what did your husband say?’ Gwen felt it was important, suddenly, to make Elaine understand; Iris hadn’t done anything wrong. She’d done her best to help.
‘He was desperate. He was in so much pain. Even the morphine didn’t take it away.’
‘But what did he say?’
Elaine was far away now; she was looking in Gwen’s direction, but seeing something else entirely. ‘He said that she comforted him.’
Gwen flinched at the raw pain in her voice and, feeling like the worst kind of bully, she said: ‘You’re angry because he turned to someone else.’
‘I was his wife,’ Elaine said. She sounded like a lost child and Gwen felt awful. Then she added, ‘Imagine how it looked,’ and Gwen felt a little better.
‘This is not the same, and I’m not Iris,’ Gwen said. ‘You can’t push me out of town. Not this time. And I won’t let you steal my house.’
‘I haven’t the faintest idea what you are talking about.’ Elaine was trying to claw back her composure, but her face was flushed and her voice shook.
‘I don’t think Cam would be very pleased to hear that you stole documents from the firm, but I’m willing to keep quiet about that if you stop trying to break us up.’
Elaine’s eyes flashed. ‘He won’t believe you.’
‘Maybe not,’ Gwen said. ‘You want to risk it?’
After a moment of seething thought, Elaine said, ‘Fine.’
‘You have to stop pressuring Cam to break things off. And let Lily know that she has to drop this legal case against me. If the title deeds to the house appear back in the folder – which I will leave on my kitchen table for the next few days – then I will simply assume they got there by magic.’
‘I agree to your terms.’ Elaine spoke as if every word was an effort.
Gwen thought about Felicity and the Christmas Eve parties. She imagined Elaine pushing suitable young women at Cam, like a linen-wearing pimp. ‘You have to invite me to the house and make me welcome.’
Elaine opened her mouth to argue, but Gwen pressed on. ‘If you don’t, I will not only tell Cam everything, but I will also give Ryan a juicy story for the paper. Insider theft within Laing and Sons; it won’t look good.’
Elaine closed her mouth with a snap. Her eyes looked murderous. ‘You wouldn’t do that. It would hurt Cameron, too.’
‘You hurt him all the time by trying to control him.’
‘I only do what’s best for him.’
‘You’re lucky his teenage rebellion involved sleeping with an unsuitable girlfriend. It could’ve been spectacular. Do we have a deal?’
Elaine inclined her head.
‘Excellent.’ Gwen stood up. ‘I brought you something.’ She unzipped her bag and pulled out the notebook. ‘Iris kept a journal. This one has a few entries about Mr Laing. She wasn’t very nice about you, I’m afraid, but I thought you might’ve been wondering about what they talked about.’
‘I didn’t enquire about my husband’s private business,’ Elaine said stiffly.
‘Well, you should have.’ Gwen put the book down on a side table. ‘I’ll see myself out.’
Elaine didn’t say anything and Gwen made her way through the echoing hall to the front door. She didn’t know if she had just left a comfort blanket o
r a bomb, but it seemed as if that journal belonged more to the Laings than it did to her. And you didn’t get to choose your inheritance.
Within minutes of leaving Elaine’s house, Gwen’s bravado fled. Her hands shook and she felt prickles of sweat on her neck. In her anxiety, she felt as if every second person was looking at her sideways. As if they distrusted her. Disliked her. Elaine’s attitude hit her all over again and her eyes prickled. Freak. Not good enough. Weirdo. Odd one out.
A woman tightened her grip on her toddler’s hand as she passed Gwen. Perhaps she was simply preparing to cross the road, but Gwen felt it as another slap in the face. She decided to go to the pub. At least she could be sure of a welcome there.
Bob was out from behind the bar, wiping down tables and laying out cruet sets for the lunch crowd. Gwen threw her bag down on the table nearest the fire and herself into a comfy chair.
‘All right, Gwennie?’ Bob said. ‘How’s tricks?’
‘Is that supposed to be funny?’
Bob grinned. ‘Just an expression.’
Gwen shoved her bag out of the way and laid her head dramatically on the scarred surface of the table. ‘Everyone hates me. I’m a disaster. I should just leave. Oh, no. I forgot, I can’t because I’ve got no money. No career.’ She was about to add no boyfriend, but was beginning to sound pathetic even to herself.
‘From what I hear, you’re the hero of the hour,’ Bob said.
Gwen lifted her head to look at him. ‘What?’
Bob swiped his cloth around. ‘Oh, yes, Fred says his chilblains have never felt better. Isn’t that right, Jack?’ Bob called out to an old man in a tired brown suit. Gwen had seen him before and he always seemed to be seated in exactly the same place, wearing the same suit. Perhaps he had a whole wardrobe of identical outfits, but Gwen doubted it. Jack raised rheumy eyes from the newspaper that he held close to his face. ‘What’s right?’
‘Our Gwennie is a regular hero.’
‘She’s a good girl.’ Jack nodded. He gave Gwen a rare smile, showing uneven teeth, then disappeared behind his paper.
‘You keep up like this, they’ll build you a bloody statue,’ Bob said.
‘No, thank you,’ Gwen said, trying not to think about the little memorial to Jane Morely on the wall of the pub.
‘Suit yourself.’ He shrugged. ‘Half the town thinks you’re some kind of guardian angel, anyway.’
Bob’s friendly smile wasn’t enough to make Gwen ignore the flaw in his sentence. ‘What about the other half, though?’ she said. ‘What have they been saying?’
Bob looked away. ‘You don’t want to worry about that.’
‘They think I’m a fraud. That I’m playing some long con. That one day, they’ll wake up and I’ll be gone with the town’s riches in my back pocket, or that I’m corrupting the town’s youth, or bringing shame onto Pendleford and ruining its reputation and its chance for development grants or tourism or whatever.’
‘Whoa, there, Gwennie.’ Bob waved his bottle of cleaner. ‘Not so dramatic. I don’t think most people have thought about it that much.’
‘Some have,’ Gwen said, ‘and, unfortunately, they tend to be pretty vocal.’
‘Have you thought about answering back?’ Bob said.
‘That doesn’t usually work out that well for me,’ Gwen said, thinking of Ruby.
‘Maybe you need to raise your voice,’ Jack said unexpectedly. He didn’t look up from his paper or speak again so Gwen looked at Bob. He raised his eyebrows and shrugged, as if to say: the octogenarian with alcohol-dependency issues has a point.
Gwen shook her head. ‘Haven’t you heard that phrase “the lady doth protest too much”? Who on earth is going to believe a word I say, however loudly I say it?’
Bob retreated behind the bar. ‘You’re the one with all the brains, Gwennie, but if I were you, I’d think about something concrete. Evidence for the defence kind of thing.’
Gwen closed her eyes. Even vaguely legal jargon made her think about Cam. Made her feel a little bit turned on, truth be told. She blinked quickly and got the hell out of the pub before she embarrassed herself in front of Bob and the town’s oldest barfly.
I wish Gloria would let me see the girls or, at least, give them the choice. I’m old enough to know that life isn’t fair, but I’ve spent the last fifty years giving people what they need, whether I’ve wanted to do it or not, even when it’s made people hate or fear me; it doesn’t seem right. And not just for myself. Poor Gwen will be coming into her gift all alone. She only has Gloria to guide her and that’s worse than nothing. Gloria will teach her that you help only when you see benefit to yourself and that is not a good path to walk. It leads to some very dark places.
Gwen clipped the entry out and added it to the pile that she counted as ‘hers’. She had several piles, now, each with a Post-it note stuck on the top and a person or family’s name, as well as a non-magical recipes pile, one full of herbalist cures, and the notebook for Ruby. She looked at the few sheets which bore Helen Brewer’s name and wondered if she was being punished for taking money for finding Archie. If she was completely honest, she’d felt a creeping guilt about that ever since. The letter from Christopher’s solicitor had been almost a relief. As if her comeuppance had finally arrived and she could deal with it. Being sued for defamation of character wasn’t top of her bucket list, but it could be worse. And Cam had said that Christopher didn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell anyway.
Across town, Gwen parked her car in Helen Brewer’s quiet cul-de-sac and rang the doorbell before she could think about it too much.
‘What do you want?’ Helen didn’t take the security chain off, but she didn’t slam the door shut either. Gwen tried to feel cheered by this.
‘May I come in?’
‘Christopher isn’t here.’
The tip of Helen’s nose was bright red. Whether from cold or crying, Gwen couldn’t tell. ‘I wanted to talk to you, actually. Five minutes?’
Helen shook her head violently. ‘It won’t do any good. I can’t control Christopher.’
‘That’s okay. It’s not about that.’
Helen shut the door and Gwen heard the chain jangle. It opened again and Helen stepped backwards. ‘Five minutes.’
The house was just as Gwen remembered it; unnaturally tidy and filled with more pastel colours than seemed sensible with a dog. She perched on the pale pink sofa. ‘How’s Archie?’
‘Fine,’ Helen said. ‘Thank you,’ she added, looking embarrassed.
‘I just came to bring you something.’ Gwen wished she’d planned something to say. It suddenly seemed unbelievably awkward. ‘I’ve been going through my great-aunt’s papers.’
Helen went very still.
‘And I feel a bit weird about it, really. She kept lots of notes, like diaries, but not really about her own life.’
‘Stuff about other people.’ Helen’s voice was barely a whisper.
Gwen stood up to pull the folded sheets of paper from her back pocket. She passed it across. ‘I don’t know what to do. I don’t want to know this stuff, so I was just going to burn the lot, but it doesn’t really feel like my property.’
Helen read the notes quickly, blushing. ‘You could use this against Christopher. Get him to drop the stupid legal thing. I told him not to sue you. I told him—’
‘That would be blackmail,’ Gwen said. ‘I wish I hadn’t read this and I’d rather just forget that I did. It’s none of my business.’
Helen gave her a long look. ‘You’re very different to Iris.’
‘Good,’ Gwen said. ‘I think.’
Helen folded the pages. ‘I’m sorry about Christopher. It turned out you were right about him. I saw him kick Archie. On Monday night, when he thought I was at bridge.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Gwen said.
Helen shook her head. ‘I thought I’d raised him better than that.’
Gwen stood up. ‘Well, thank you for seeing me.’
Helen rose a
nd walked her to the door. The wind had picked up and was howling outside, a cold draught flowing in from the badly fitted letterbox.
‘I’ll see what I can do,’ Helen said suddenly. ‘I’m sure Christopher will drop this nonsense when he realises I won’t back him up.’
‘I really appreciate it,’ Gwen said carefully.
‘He kicked my dog,’ Helen snapped. ‘It’s nothing to do with you.’
‘Right. Bye, then.’ Gwen was halfway down the path when Helen called out, ‘You should burn it all. But make sure everyone knows you’ve done it.’ Then she raised her hand in a half-wave and shut the door.
Gwen got into Nanette and turned the heater up full. It wasn’t a bad idea, actually. Holding a public bonfire might make her look like a lunatic, but appearing normal didn’t seem to be on the cards any more. In for a penny …
Back at home, Gwen looked up the number for The Chronicle on Ruby’s second-best laptop and dialled. The helpful woman who answered the phone explained that Ryan was on his lunch break and, with minimal prompting, that he was taking it at The Red Lion. Twenty minutes later, Gwen walked into the pub. Both fires were blazing and Gwen, already warm from her speed-walk into town, pulled off her coat and scarf.
‘All right, Gwennie?’ Bob hailed her, then turned his attention back to the pint he was pulling. The place was packed and Gwen was surprised at just how many people she recognised. Stranger yet were the number of nods, smiles and greetings as she made her way to the back room.
Ryan was sitting on his own, his back to Gwen. She had no trouble recognising him, though, and complimented herself for her restraint in not slapping the back of his rosy-red neck. There was a spare chair at the little table and she sat down. Ryan looked up and did a double-take. ‘Um—’ he began, less than brilliantly.
‘I’ll be honest with you,’ Gwen said, stealing one of Ryan’s chips and pointing it at his chest. ‘You’re not my favourite person at the moment.’
‘What?’ Ryan seemed mesmerised by the chip, but he managed to drag his attention to Gwen’s face. ‘What do you want?’
‘I want to put an advert in the paper but I’m broke, so I want you to write an article instead so it doesn’t cost me anything.’
The Language of Spells Page 25