The Corrigan legacy

by Anna Jacobs

  When she came to, Mitch was crouched over her protectively and Des was sitting part-way up the stairs with his head in his hands.

  Her son clutched her hand. 'Don't try to move, Mum. The ambulance is on its way. I think you've hurt your knee. It's badly swollen.'

  She moved her head to look and couldn't hold back a whimper of pain at even this small movement.

  Des raised his head. 'Hell, I'm sorry, Judith, truly sorry. I didn't mean to—'

  She closed her eyes. Didn't speak. Didn't want to see him or speak to him ever again. Just held her son's hand and waited to be carried out of her husband's life on a stretcher.

  Cheshire. A stark January day. An icy wind savages the broomstick trees. Flurries of chill drops make a vain assault on the double glazing.

  Oblivious to the weather, Maeve Corrigan sat bolt upright in her favourite armchair and made her announcement to Andy Blauman in measured tones.

  Which jerked him out of his relaxed sprawl into instant, shocked attention. 'Ah, Maeve, no!'

  'I don't want your pity, just your help, Andy. And in return, I'll—'

  'You know you've no need to bribe me to help you - whatever the circumstances.' His gaze was reproachful.

  While the wind whistled in shrill encouragement outside, she speared him with one of her famous looks, keeping him and his pity at bay. 'I have always paid my way and I intend to continue doing so until the day they carry me out of here feet first.' Which was, unfortunately, going to be sooner than she'd expected.

  But when he rushed across to fold her in his arms, for a moment -just one moment of weakness - she couldn't bear to push him away, and sagged against the warmth of his young body, stroking his curly hair.

  Like a teddy bear he was, this large American of Irish-Jewish descent who had come to Ireland as a young man to find his mother's family, had followed the trail of his distant relatives to Maeve in Lancashire and had stayed there for over ten years. He had a softness to him that he tried in vain to hide and when he'd first come to work for her, she'd had to teach him how to be firm with the workers. If he hadn't learned, she wouldn't have kept him on, but he picked things up quickly, did Andy. Now, well, she didn't know what she would do without him, needed him for the next two years to implement the provisions of her will and manage her legacy to her family. And as she couldn't be here, she intended to bind him to herself and her heirs legally.

  As she felt tears welling in her eyes she shoved him away, concentrating on the anger that had been simmering within her ever since her last trip to the oncologist. 'Get away with you!' She blinked furiously, refusing to weep in front of him or anyone. 'Sit down again, will you, and listen to what I want you to do.'

  Five minutes later he was scowling. 'Maeve Corrigan, that's outrageous!'

  She beamed at him, restored to good humour by her own cunning. 'Yes. It is, rather. So you'll do it for me, then, Andy?'

  He was sulky now. 'What choice do I have? As if I'd desert you at a time like this!'

  She smiled at that admission. She didn't intend to give him or anyone else a choice and would conduct this business of dying in her own way, as she had done everything else in her life since she had turned twenty-one. Right from her childhood she had found it deeply satisfying to make people dance to her tune. Well, why not? She always knew exactly what she wanted and the best way to get it, while other folk rarely did.

  Except that she hadn't been able to bear children. That had been her one failure in life, the main thing she regretted now. But nature had denied her this privilege.

  Her two brothers had children, though, five of them. And they would be her heirs. But the main Corrigan legacy, her money, would go to only one, whoever seemed the most capable of holding it together.

  Two

  Australia. January. A month of searing heat and bushfires. Seven o 'clock in the morning and sunshine is already poking hot fingers through windows, making pampered, foreign flowers in gardens shrivel and die.

  And yet Kate Corrigan woke up feeling shivery. As she got out of bed, the room wavered around her and she had to clutch the chest of drawers or she'd have fallen over. Her legs felt wobbly, her head throbbed with every movement she made, while her face - she grimaced at it in the mirror - was sickly white, in shocking contrast to the flaring red of her hair.

  She looked like a Modigliani woman today, attenuated, mournful, not quite real. Felt as two-dimensional as one of his paintings, too.

  Damn! She must have caught the flu that was going round at work.

  In the kitchen, her partner Joe was eating his usual greasy platter of eggs and bacon. Summer or winter, he always started the day with a fry-up, the mere smell of which sickened her, for she was definitely not a morning person.

  'Hey, you're late today,' he teased, not even glancing up. 'The kettle's just boiled. Get yourself an injection of good old English Breakfast tea. You'll feel better then.'

  His voice seemed to echo round the kitchen of the flat they shared. It boomed inside her head, too, and she winced as she sagged against the doorpost. Someone seemed to have sandpapered her throat during the night, so her words came out huskily. 'Joe, I think I've got the flu.'

  He stopped eating to turn and stare at her. "You? You never catch anything!'

  'I had a bad dose of flu eighteen months ago, just before I met you. It lasted for weeks. I couldn't seem to shake it.'

  'You never told me.'

  'Why should I? It was over and done with by then.' She massaged her temples with her fingertips, but that didn't prevent the bongo drums from thumping away inside her skull. 'Would you get me a cup of tea, please?'

  Her asking a favour in such a hesitant voice was enough to make him put down his knife and fork and come over to tilt her chin up with one hand while studying her face. 'You look dreadful, woman. No wonder you went to bed early last night. Want me to make an appointment at the doctor's for you?'

  She shrugged his hand off. 'Why bother? Everyone knows how to treat flu. Go to bed, dose yourself with aspirin and rest. If I take a couple of days off, I can—'

  He turned her in the direction of the bedroom and pushed her gently along the corridor. 'Get back to bed this minute. You're as white as my shirt and you look heavy-eyed. Jt's a bad flu, this one. My secretary was off work for two weeks and only came back yesterday. She still felt rotten, though, and went home early, so I'll be surprised if she turns up again today.'

  Kate pushed him away then had to lean against the wall to steady herself. 'Well, I can't afford more than a couple of days off. Hell, I can't even afford those, really. I've a workshop to run on Friday for this new mid-management training programme.'

  He said nothing, just put the kettle on. Kate Corrigan was fun, attractive and passionate. She had a fine brain and a fine body, too, slender, but soft and welcoming when you made love. But she was also the most stubborn woman he'd met in his whole life. If she was dying and decided to go into work first, she'd hire two men with a stretcher and do it.

  He took her a mug of tea and a couple of paracetamols. 'Want me to bring you some toast as well?'

  She covered her eyes with her forearm and shuddered. 'No thanks. I'll just take these tablets and have a nap. Could you draw the curtains again, please?'

  'Want me to ring work for you?' he called from a million miles above her head. 'Kate?'

  She peered at him from the shadow of her arm. 'Of course I don't! I can do my own bloody telephoning. This is only a touch of flu, for heaven's sake!'

  When she woke, Kate felt totally disoriented and it was a few minutes before she realized it was after ten o'clock and she'd not yet contacted work. Oh hell, and she'd missed her first meeting, too! She rolled over and reached for the phone.

  Her head swam the minute she lifted it from the pillow and she dialled the number with great difficulty, because the keypad seemed to be jiggling about in front of her. 'I've got flu,' she croaked to the receptionist. 'Can you tell Peter I won't be in today, probably not tomorrow, either
?'

  'Yeah, sure. Do you have any appointments that need cancelling?'

  Kate tried to think and couldn't. Her head was full of grey concrete, far too heavy to hold upright. 'Will you look in my desk diary, please? I can't seem to think straight.'

  'You sound really bad. Have you seen the doctor?'

  'No.'

  'Well, you'd better—'

  'Bye.' Kate put down the phone. She couldn't even raise the energy to argue. Which was not like her.

  Next time she woke it was two o'clock and she was bursting to go to the bathroom. She sat up and immediately fell sideways on the pillows as the room whirled round her. Standing up was an act of will and she lurched from one piece of furniture to the other like a drunkard.

  It was hot so she switched on the air conditioner on the way back to bed, sighing in relief as cool air began to waft around her.

  When she woke again, Joe had just arrived home. Why in heaven's name did he always have to bang the front door shut so loudly?

  He came to stand in the doorway of her bedroom. 'Good thing I came home early. You look bloody awful, Kate!'

  'I feel bloody awful.'

  'I'd better sleep in the spare bedroom tonight. Did you go to the doctor's?'

  'No. I slept most of the day.'

  'I'll make an appointment for you right away, then.'

  Her protests fell on empty air. He made the appointment, overrode her protests then had to support her out to the car, she was so groggy.

  'A fortnight off work, at least,' the doctor said. 'Remember what happened to you last year when you didn't take care of yourself?'

  We'll see about that, Kate decided on the way home. A week off work was plenty long enough. She wasn't an old woman, but a fit twenty-eight-year-old. This time, unlike last year, she'd take plenty of vitamins, really cosset herself for a few days. Sometimes you had to give in to these things. But only for a short time. It didn't do to wallow in illness. What did doctors know, anyway? She'd seen a programme on television last week which said that medicine was an art, not a science. She agreed absolutely.

  After Judith came out of hospital, where she'd needed an operation on her knee, she moved into a luxury hotel at her husband's expense - an offer conveyed to her by his lawyer with extreme care to include no admission of Des's liability for her 'accident'. Her mother had offered to have her, but that would have involved stairs and anyway, why shouldn't Des pay for what he'd done?

  She'd have to do several weeks of physiotherapy to get the knee right, which would mean staying here in London instead of settling into her aunt's old home in Lancashire.

  Her son came to take afternoon tea with her after school on her first day at the hotel.

  They'd avoided talking of it until now but she had to start making long-term plans. 'What have you decided to do, Mitch?'

  'What have you decided, Mum?'

  'As I said the other night, I'm going to live in my aunt's old house in Lancashire - for a while, anyway. Do you fancy coming with me? You know I'd love to have you.'

  As he avoided her eyes and began to fiddle with the crumbs on his plate she knew she'd guessed right.

  'I can't, Mum. I've got exams coming up in a few months. The big ones. I want to do well, so I can't risk changing schools.' Suddenly he looked younger, unsure of himself. 'There's no chance of you and Dad - you know, getting back together? He's really sorry for what he did.'

  'I'm sure he is. It's costing him a packet as well as putting him in a bad position for negotiating a divorce settlement.

  And no, there's no chance whatsoever, even if he hadn't thumped me.'

  'He hasn't hit you before, has he?'

  She could sense the desperate anxiety behind his words. 'No, Mitch, he hasn't. I don't think he really meant to hit me this time, either, but he seems to have been getting a bit short-tempered recently.'

  He sighed in relief and closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them and asked, 'What did he do - to make you leave him? I - um - didn't hear that bit and he won't tell me.'

  'The last straw was tricking his sister into selling her business to him.'

  'Oh.' Long pause, then, 'What was the first straw?'

  Trust Mitch to realize there was more to it. She hesitated, but decided her son was old enough to understand. 'He's been unfaithful to me - several times - almost from when we first married.' And how humiliating was that? 'You have another half-sister besides Liz's daughters. This one is twelve now.'

  'Oh.'

  Judith tried to make a joke of it. 'This needn't affect your relationship with your father. He's not been unfaithful to you, after all.'

  Mitch gazed at her with a face so full of untarnished idealism that she could have wept for what life would inevitably do to him.

  'When I take over the business, Mum,' he said in the tone of one swearing a solemn oath, 'I won't do anything unethical, I promise you.'

  'I didn't realize you were planning to take over the business.'

  'One day, yes. I like organizing things. Dad doesn't and he leaves too much of the important stuff to other people. I can do better than that, or I will be able to when I've got my MBA and gained some experience. I intend to go to Harvard for the postgraduate stuff. They have a mission to educate leaders who will make a difference in the world.'

  'Sounds good. You'll have to work hard to get in.'

  'I like studying.'

  More silence then he finally answered her question. 'If it's any consolation, I don't plan to live with Dad. I'll stay with Gran for the next few months, until the exams are over and then, once I get to university, I'll live in. She says it's all right with her. Will Dad agree, do you think?'

  'As long as I'm not getting you, I doubt he'll care.' Besides, Des got on really well with her mother.

  'I'll come and visit you in the holidays, though.'

  What he said next was not what she expected.

  'It must be great to have parents who love one another. I'm really lucky that I've got Gran to turn to.'

  Judith had to force the words out because her throat was thick with tears. 'I'm going to miss you a lot, Mitch.'

  'I know. But you've got your painting. You're good at it.'

  'Not good enough to make my living by it. I've known that for a while. I've tried hard and I'm competent technically, but my teachers haven't hidden the fact that there's something missing, that I'll never make a top drawer artist. So I'll have to find something else to do with my time.' She had to wipe away a tear with her fingertip.

  He reached out and patted her arm awkwardly, for he was at an age where casual touching and kissing embarrassed him. 'Sorry, I didn't realize. I don't know much about art. I like some of your paintings very much, though. Can I have that one of sunset over the river to hang in my bedroom at Gran's?'

  She nodded. It was her favourite, too. She'd done it a couple of years ago and her teacher had praised her so unstintingly she'd rushed home to show it to Des and tell him. After that, however, her teacher had never been quite as enthusiastic about what she produced, so she'd come to realize that the painting was the nearest she'd got to being really good.

  Another pause then he added, 'We can email each other every day. You really will have to learn more about computers now.'

  'All right. It's a deal. You can teach me before you leave.'

  He began fiddling with his watch. 'I don't think it'll break your heart me living with Gran. I've been reading a few books about relationships, trying to understand this mess. You never give yourself fully to anyone, Mum.'

  She stared back, astounded. He was too perceptive by far, this son of hers. Were all modern children this aware, or had she and Des done it to him? 'I do care about you, you know, Mitch,' she said, choosing her words carefully. 'Very much indeed, more than I care about anyone else.' She watched a thoughtful expression settle on his face, and refrained from adding that Des wasn't the sort of person to whom you revealed everything. She'd always known that and acted accordingly. But she
hadn't realized she'd been guarded with Mitch as well.

  'You care about me in your own way, on your own terms,' he went on. 'Not enough to let me spend much time with my sisters or have them round at our house.'

  Not that old complaint again! 'Half-sisters, actually.' And why should she encourage it? Whenever he visited them, he came back dissatisfied, angry about not seeing them more often, frequently taking that anger out on her, since his father was rarely around. Des's first wife didn't really want Mitch visiting them, either, and was quite rude about it on the phone sometimes, but Liz hadn't stopped him going there.

  It was strange how well he got on with them, his older half-sisters, how the three of them schemed to meet and spend time together. When Lacey got married in a couple of months it'd be even easier for them to meet, because she'd have her own home. Mitch would be going to the wedding with his father now, because Judith was no longer in the picture for such family occasions. She sighed. She'd never had Liz's touch for bringing children up, showering them with open affection, crawling around the floor with them when they were little, sitting for hours with them on her knees, from all she'd heard.

  But though Mitch was right, it was partly Des's fault. He'd been very demanding of her time when they were first married and hadn't paid much attention to their son. He said they had a nanny for that. She should have gone against Des's wishes and taken a bigger part in the daily tasks of raising Mitch, she saw that now.

  It was too late to remedy matters. Too late to remedy a lot of things.

  Judith sat and chatted with Mitch until it was time for him to go back to his grandmother's for the evening meal, enjoying his company, agreeing to start computer lessons soon.

  It wasn't until later, after the staff had cleared away her half-eaten room-service meal and wished her a good night's sleep, that she let herself weep about moving north, away from her son and mother. There was no one here to see her weeping, after all.