Okay, so Ned knew about his own fiddles and the gambling and the debts. But that was positively clean compared to this other stuff, wasn't it? There was no comparison between his addiction and Matt's. No comparison at all.
Vincent had insisted that Jemima should be kept completely in dark – and that Matt must end their relationship as soon as possible. Then all he had to do was explain to Tina Maloret. Vincent winced. He wasn't too happy about that bit. Especially as Tina Maloret was also embroiled with Charlie. How long would it be before someone discovered what was going on? Christ! Still, Matt had assured him that he could handle it – and her. He'd just have to trust him.
And the Aintree scam? Well, as far as they both could see, that would go ahead. Matt was adamant on that point. He'd win the National. Even if it meant injuring Charlie to do it. Matt had a whole tree of chips on his shoulder. Winning the National was the only way he would ever hack his way free of them.
Vincent glanced at his watch. Nearly midday. He might as well go to the pub and get it over.
Ned was waiting for him, a pint of bitter at the ready. Vincent squeezed himself between the crowds – the place was packed with stable lads drinking themselves silly on their day off – and sat down. 'O Come All Ye Faithful' played in rap time made conversation impossible.
'Garside buggered off to the bosom of his family, has he?' Ned yelled in between verses. 'Did what you were told? Saw him on his way?'
Vincent nodded.
'Good on yer, Vince, mate.' Ned dug into the back pocket of his trousers. 'Here's your Christmas bonus, then. Don't spend it all at once.'
Vincent blinked at the wad of notes. Oh, God! He wasn't a saint. He couldn't give this up. Ned, despite being a ferret-faced bastard, had never let him down. This was so, so easy. He'd done his bit anyway, long before he realised it. He'd given away the information from Peapods that Ned had needed. This was simply the return. He couldn't do any more harm now, thank goodness. There was nothing left to do but to sit back and wait for the Grand< National.
The juke-box burst into a reggae version of 'Silent Night'.
'Sorry.' Vincent grabbed at his pint and stood up. 'I can't cope with this. Coming through to the Snug?'
Ned trotted behind him. The Snug was also packed but the cannibalised carols were mercifully muffled.
'Got to be making tracks,' Ned said, draining his Guinness. 'I'm going to me sister and her family for Christmas.'
Vincent stared. It seemed incongruous – Ned, with all his unscrupulous fiddles, sitting down like everyone else on Christmas morning and unwrapping presents with his family, eating a massive celebratory dinner, and probably dozing in front of the Queen during the afternoon. Vincent hadn't really considered that felons had holidays too.
'So,' Ned held out a skinny hand and pumped Vincent's arm chummily. 'Season's greetings an' all that, Vince, mate. Thanks for your backing. All we have to do now is sit tight until April and collect our dosh. See you in the New Year. And,' he tapped the side of his greasy nose, 'mum's the word.'
Vincent nodded like an automaton, wanting to wrench his hand free. As soon as Ned had gone he'd go into the gents' loo and scrub every trace of the bastard away. In the meantime he bought himself another pint, wondered what the hell Vicar Glen would make of Fizz Flanagan's version of 'Away in a Manger', and thought happily of Maureen.
Half an hour later he wandered back over Peapods' cobbles. He'd passed the bookshop – Jemima had waved to him from behind her still-busy counter, so they were still friends – and popped his head round the door of the Munchy Bar. Maureen, serving fry-ups to those who knew they had a week of cooking ahead of them, gave him a wink and a thumbs-up. He grinned to himself. The women in his life were well and happy. He'd go home and sleep for an hour, then start distributing his presents round the village. He’d given Maddy and Drew and Poppy theirs the previous day, so he'd start out at the James-Jordans' place and work inwards.
He was quite keen to glean whatever information was going about the New Year Nuke, to be honest. He'd never been to a rave before. The nearest he'd got was the Shepton Mallett Blues Festival in the sixties. He wondered if it was similar. Maureen might quite enjoy it.
'Vincent! Quick!'
Drew was belting across the yard towards him. Drew never ran. Not in the yard. He never shouted either.
'What's up?'
'The baby!' Drew grabbed his arm. 'She's started having the baby.'
'Wonderful – I didn't see you take her in –'
'I didn't. I haven't. She's in the kitchen!'
'You'd better get a move on then. You bring the car round and I'll go and see what I can do.' He tried to remember what had happened with Jemima. It was all pretty hazy. 'Er – have you phoned the hospital to say you're on your way?'
'Of course I fucking have! But there's no time! Come on!'
Vincent smiled to himself as they ran back across the cobbles and under the clock arch. Bless him. Drew was just as excited as he had been all those years ago. Still, this was his second. You'd think he'd be a bit more calm about it. He followed him through the outhouse and into the kitchen.
'Christ!' On second thoughts....
Vincent took one look at Maddy sprawled in the rocking chair and nearly fainted.
'Hi...' she panted through gritted teeth and a tangle of hair. 'Drew's-a-bastard.'
'Can't we get her into bed or something?' He looked at Drew. 'And where the hell is everyone else?'
'I'm-not-bloody-moving,' Maddy puffed. 'Don't-touch-me.'
'Maddy's parents and Suzy have taken Poppy into Newbury to see Father Christmas.' Drew knelt by the rocking chair, holding both of Maddy's clenching hands and wincing. 'She said nothing was happening. She said she'd be fine for days yet. Not even a twinge...
'It-wasn't-like-this-with-Poppy – Oh, shit!'
'Second ones are usually quicker,' Vincent said, remembering something he'd read in one of Rosemary's magazines. 'Um – shall I get Charlie?'
'No!' Drew and Maddy yelled together.
'He's gone to Newbury with the others.' Drew smoothed Maddy's hair away from her face. 'Remember to breathe. It's all right, darling. It's all right...'
'It's-not-bloody-all-right-you-bastard!'
Grimacing against the scream, Vincent belted out into the hall. Phone – where was the bloody phone? He punched out 999 and asked for an ambulance. Maddy screamed again from the kitchen. He felt very sick.
The calm voice on the other end said cheerfully that the ambulance had already been contacted and would be there as quickly as possible, but due to an RTA on the A34 there may be some delay.
'But the baby's coming!' Vincent howled. 'Get an ambulance!'
The calm voice asked questions which he couldn't answer, then suggested that maybe Drew would be more use.
Vincent swung round the kitchen door. 'Drew – speak to the woman on the phone! She's giving instructions! I'll stay here!'
'Piss-off!' Maddy spat. 'I-hate-fucking-men!'
When Jemima had been born he'd stayed outside the delivery room. He had paced up and down with the other expectant fathers who were not yet new enough men to be standing at the foot of the bed with a camcorder. All his information on the techniques of childbirth had been gleaned from television. Mostly from Westerns. The women always seemed to have their wrists tied to brass bedsteads, wear a lot of petticoats, and still have their boots on.
Towels ... hot water ... something to wipe her forehead ... No, possibly not. Maddy looked like she'd bite him if he tried that. He squatted beside her.
You should be lying down.'
I-should-be – kneeling – in – a – birthing – pool – with – whale – music – so – sod – off. Oooh!'
Taking one frantic look, Vincent shepherded all the animals into the outhouse and slammed the door. As gently as he could, he lifted Maddy out of the chair and laid her on the floor beside the fire. He wasn't sure if it was hygienic – it just seemed that being doubled up in the rocking chair mu
st only increase the pain. Surprisingly, she offered very little resistance.
He pushed cushions under her head and tried to avert his gaze from the bare legs.
'Thanks-and-I-think-I'm-going-to-be-sick.'
God – he flew back to the doorway. Drew, still on the phone, was writing things on the back of an envelope and muttering words like dilations and timed contractions and bearing down and pushing and not pushing and panting.
Shit. It was far too complicated. He ran back into the kitchen and knelt beside Maddy who'd stopped shouting and had her eyes closed. Oh, my God! Had she passed out?
Her eyes shot open and her teeth bared and she yelled. Just once. Vincent heard Drew drop the phone. Christ! The baby's head was there! Somewhere above Maddy's groans and laboured breathing he could hear 'Silent Night' playing as Drew belted in from the hall. At least it was the authorised version.
'Keep pushing.' Vincent closed his eyes and went in blind. He'd die if he hurt her. 'Maddy – don't cry – I think – I think I've got it – oh!'
He sat back with amazement, tears streaming down his face. The slithering, bloodied, tiny body was squirming in his hands. Drew, laughing and crying and still holding his notes, picked it up and laid it on Maddy's chest.
The room seemed strangely quiet. Then the baby yelled.
'It's a boy,' Drew was weeping unashamedly. 'A boy ...'
Vincent swallowed as they cried together, and tried to stand up. His legs were far too wobbly so he sat on the hearth-rug again. It was the most amazing moment of his entire life.
'Do we have to cut the cord?'
'The midwife's about two minutes away.' Drew was stroking Maddy's hair and kissing her and telling her how much he loved her. 'She'll take over – and thank you. Thank you so much...'
Clutching at the table for support, Vincent hauled himself to his feet. Maddy smiled sleepily up at him. 'You were brilliant. Thanks a million.'
'You did all the hard work. No, no I'll leave you alone together. It's all right –'
Drew, still gazing at the baby and Maddy in complete disbelief, touched Vincent's arm. 'We'll never be able to thank you enough for this.'
Vincent sniffed. 'Don't be daft. You'd have managed fine without me. I'll go and see if the midwife has arrived – or the ambulance. Point them in the right direction...
Vincent absent-mindedly patted the animals on his way through the outhouse, and watched as the midwife's hatchback screeched to a halt and she bustled under the clock arch. The ambulance wouldn't be too far behind. They'd all be all right now. Maddy and Drew and the baby. They'd be fine.
He wiped his hand across his eyes, feeling the tears trickle through his fingers.
'It was wonderful,' he said for the thousandth time, curled against Maureen's back, his arm resting comfortably across her ample waist. 'One of the most incredible moments of my life.'
'I'm glad you said one of them.' Maureen turned beneath the candyfloss-pink duvet and smiled at him in the semi-darkness. It's been quite a Christmas Eve, duck, what with one thing and another, hasn't it?'
It had. It truly had.
He traced the plaited ribbons in Maureen's peach nightie. 'I'll never forget today as long as I live.'
Nor will I.' She snuggled against him, sweet-smelling, warm, comforting. 'I reckons this is what Christmas is all about, duck, don't you?'
Sleeping with someone else's wife? Hardly. Vincent blinked a bit in the low glow of the pink tiffany lamp. Maureen nudged him playfully. 'Not that! Just all the friendships, and the closeness, and being together. And the baby. That about put the icing on it.'
Vincent sighed happily. Daragh Vincent Fitzgerald was spending his first night under Peapods' roof. They'd taken Maddy and the baby into hospital for a check-up, and Drew had brought them home just after eight. He'd managed to poke his head round the door of the Cat and Fiddle, give everyone an update, say that the drinks were on him, and was kissed by every woman in the place before going home to his family.
Vincent cuddled a bit more into Maureen's billowy warmth. It was sheer bliss. She moved her face closer to his on the frilly turquoise pillow, the blonde hair splayed out like a manic halo. 'Jemima seemed really pleased to be coming to us tomorrow, didn't she, duck?'
Vincent nodded. She had. He'd thought that she might turn him down after the hoo-ha at Matt's, but she'd seemed rather pleased to have been asked. It would be lovely to be all together – Christmas Day was no time to be alone. He was going to collect her from the Vicarage really early and they'd all go to morning service – at Maureen's insistence – and then back to the Munchy Bar's flat for the rest of the day.
Maureen had a fibre-optic Christmas tree which glowed in a constantly changing rainbow, and the presents had been stacked under it. Cards were festooned round the walls like a washing-line, and the larder and fridge doors were straining at their hinges. He'd have Jemima and Maureen, food, drink, warmth, and happiness. Vincent couldn't have wished for anything more.
'Just one thing,' Jemima had said. 'Tomorrow I don't want to talk about Matt. I don't want to spoil Christmas. But there are things we need to discuss, Dad, aren't there?'
Vincent had fudged a bit and muttered about things not being all they seemed, and Jemima had stopped him with one of her looks.
'I don't know why you were at Matt's and I don't know where he's gone. I'm sure you'll have a really good explanation, won't you?'
He'd tried saying something about just popping into Matt's for a Christmas drink and Matt going home to Devon – which was true, as far as he knew – and she shouldn't be so suspicious. Jemima had smiled sadly and walked away from him.
He groaned softly in the darkness. He was going to tell her. Oh, not tomorrow. Not on Christmas Day. And not all of it – he couldn't do that. But before Matt came back to Milton St John, he'd let her know everything he safely could. Whether she'd ever speak to him again remained to be seen.
'What's up, duck?' Maureen asked drowsily. 'Not cold, are you?'
He shook his head and took a deep breath. 'If I told you that I'd lied ever since I came here, would you hate me?'
'Still married, are you?' Maureen gurgled. 'Well, that wouldn't bother me too much under the circumstances.'
'I'm not married. But everything I've told everyone since I arrived has been a fabrication. I've never been a gardener – I'm a bankrupt. A compulsive gambler. I lived in a bedsit on the Social because of my gambling. That's why Jemima didn't like horse-racing. That's why Rosemary left me.'
Maureen was silent for a while. Vincent touched the brittle hair and heard her sigh.
'Maureen?'
'I guessed you wasn't a gardener, duck. But you've done all right. No one suspects – 'cept Maddy at first, of course, when you pulled up all them flowers – but since then you've worked hard for them at Peapods to put things right, and they're not ones to ask questions. They think the world of you, and everyone else thinks you're the real McCoy, duck. And as for the gambling – well, it's no big surprise. I knew there was something. There's a lot of unpleasantness behind the chintz, especially in a place like this. We've all got secrets we'd rather stayed out of sight.'
He hugged her. 'I've done some really bad things.'
'Show me someone who hasn't.'
He had to do it. He couldn't keep it a secret anymore. If Maureen blew his cover, then so what? It had been really good. He'd have the memories. 'All my money doesn't come from gardening ...'
Daft Maureen pulled herself up in bed and looked down on him lovingly. 'Do you think I didn't know that? If you and Ned Filkins are having a little bit of a razzle, who am I to blow the whistle? Ned's already told me that my Brian will be the first to know of our – um – friendship if I so much as opens me mouth about anything.'
Oh, Christ. He should have known.
'Should I go to the police, do you think? Should I tell Kath and Drew and everyone what's going on?'
'Is anyone going to get hurt – other than in the pocket?'
Vincent shook his head. They weren't. Well – of course, there was the Grand National and Charlie, of course – but that was too far-fetched for words. 'No one. In fact everyone seems to come out of it okay, actually.'
'Then let sleeping dogs lie, that's my advice. It's been done before in this village – and it'll be done again. There's fortunes made and lost in racing in ways that would make old A1 Capone curl up and die.' Maureen slithered down beside him again and enfolded him with her marshmallow arms. 'Just listen to that wind. Fair howling across the Downs. And the sleet rattling against the window. And we're in here snug as bugs. Blooming lovely, isn't it? Happy Christmas, duck.'
Chapter Thirty-four
'Happy Christmas.' Matt walked up behind Tina and, putting his fingers beneath her ribs, encircled her naked slenderness.
'That was yesterday.'
'It feels like the rest of my life.' He bit her shoulder none too gently, his teeth grazing the skin stretched over the clavicle. 'Happy Boxing Day, then. So what exactly are we going to do today?'
'I have no idea.' Still in his arms, she turned to face him. They leaned against the white railings of the balcony. 'But then, you're the one with the imagination, aren't you?'
Imagination? Him? Stolid, solid, Mr Average? Except he wasn't. Not any more. Tina Maloret had changed everything. He'd hated her and it had made everything perfect.
'You choose.' He stared at her body, still trying to believe that this wasn't a fantasy. Still trying to get his head round the fact that they were together; that Fate and mutual predilections had given them this – what? Happiness? Satisfaction? Love? 'As long as it doesn't involve getting dressed ...'
God! Had he said that? Had he said half the things that had tumbled from his lips since he and Tina had been together? He was turning into Charlie Somerset. He laughed. No, he wasn't. Charlie hadn't been able to do this. For once he'd beaten Charlie hands down.
You mean,' he'd asked incredulously after that first time, 'that I'm better than Charlie Somerset?'
Better,' Tina had said, smiling at him, 'is subjective. It depends °n what you want in the first place, doesn't it? You give me exactly what I want – and I have a feeling that it's a reciprocal arrangement.'
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