Red is for Rubies

by Linda Mitchelmore

  ‘Next week?’ Ralph laughed. It was a joke but he couldn’t wait to make love to Lydie, who had held out against sex up until now. He ran an exploratory hand up the side of her waist, his fingers brushing a breast. But Lydie pushed him away.

  ‘If we can fix it. And Ralph, I’ll do my best to be the sort of wife you want. I promise.’

  ‘You like them?’ Lydie asked. This was the fourth shop she’d tried and for the fourth time she’d been told her rings and pendants could be left in a display cabinet. Twenty per cent on sales. In the first shop, two rings had been sold by an assistant while she was still talking to the owner. It had been more than worth the long hours Lydie had worked into the night to get enough samples made to tout around. Ralph wasn’t going to like this, she knew that. It would mean her travelling more, stopping over with her dad more. Not that Ralph ever voiced his opinions very loudly, quite the opposite. Indulged was how she felt when she was with Ralph, and her guilty secret had never allowed her to enjoy that feeling.

  But she felt almost euphoric now that she was doing something for herself. She was on the cusp of being able to make a living that would support her, should it need to in the future, just as it had helped the family finances when Ralph’s business had almost gone under. She wouldn’t have to rely on Ralph for money if she didn’t want to. And, sadly, she’d got to the stage where she didn’t feel she could any more.

  ‘More than like them,’ the boutique owner said, dragging Lydie’s mind back to the present. ‘They’re very unusual. Half retro, half cutting-edge. But leave yourself plenty of free time because I think these little darlings are going to just walk off the shelves!’ The owner of Angels slipped one of Lydie’s silver and moonstone rings onto her wedding finger. ‘You’ve got your first sale! I’m Josie Fraser, by the way.’

  ‘Goodness, Josie, you don’t have to do that, buy something I mean,’ Lydie said. Her mobile began to ring. ‘Sorry. I’ll switch it off.’

  ‘No. Answer it. I don’t mind.’

  But Lydie switched it off anyway.

  ‘It’s probably not important. And if it is, whoever it is will ring back, won’t they?’

  ‘Probably not. Sign of the times. If you’re not there they move on to the next one down the line. If you’re not pushed for time I’m popping next door for a coffee, we could talk more.’

  ‘I’d love to, but not this time. I need to be getting back. To Devon. Where I live.’ At the moment – but for how much longer. And really Lydie knew she should have done. She’d been cool with Ralph on the phone the last time she’d spoken to him and none of how she felt was his fault. The fault lay with her, not being true to herself all those years ago when she ought to have been. She would go back. They would talk. They would find their own happiness again, Lydie was sure of it. It was just that it probably wouldn’t be together.

  ‘Oh shame.’ Josie handed Lydie a business card. ‘When you’ve got a moment, ring me. I’ve got contacts all over the place – London, Glasgow, Paris, Bruges. I’m desperately trying to get into the US as well, but it’s slow going. Once you get a film star at a premiere wearing something you’ve made then well, you’re made too! But I’m keeping you. Sorry.’

  Lydie was sorry too, more than sorry. She really liked Josie and felt if she’d still been living in Bath she might be on the cusp of a really good friendship, both personal and business. She couldn’t think why she hadn’t tried Angels as an outlet for her work before, and now wished she had. Perhaps the move to Devon might not have happened if she had. Oh well, no point wondering about ifs.

  ‘I’d love to have coffee with you some other time. And soon. But I really will have to go now. It’s a longish journey and I’d like to get as much of it behind me before dusk if possible.’

  Lydie and Josie said their goodbyes and then Lydie, her heart lighter than it had been for years, rushed back to her car, sped along Lansdown Road and turned sharply into the car park at the end of Robert’s long garden. Her bag was already packed but she’d need to collect her silver-smithing things together, scoop all the semi-precious stones and the beads back into their respective boxes. Then, with luck, in four hours or so she’d be back in Dartmouth.

  Robert was walking down the path towards her – almost as though he’d been waiting for her, Lydie thought. How old he was beginning to look. Lydie watched his measured steps, the careful way he was placing one foot in front of the other, as though it were a struggle and his mind had forgotten how to make his legs work. His hair was thinning, and by the way he’d greedily devoured the meals she’d cooked him she guessed he wasn’t eating properly. ‘Men aren’t supposed to be the ones left to cope alone, Lydie,’ he’d said when she’d commented lightly on his appetite.

  ‘We should never have left him,’ she whispered to herself. Robert was going to need care before much longer, she could see that now.

  ‘Hi, Dad, been missing me?’ she said, breezily, even the issue of future care for her father far from her mind now she had a possible full-time career at the forefront of her thoughts.

  ‘There’s been a phone call. Some chap in Devon. Grace’s boss, so he said. Grace has had some sort of accident. She’s …’

  ‘No! Not my beautiful Gracie!’ Lydie’s hands flew to her mouth. Ralph had told her Grace had got a job but she hadn’t asked what – she’d been too wrapped up in herself. And Ralph hadn’t said. She ought to have phoned, or texted, Grace to congratulate her on the job at least. Why hadn’t she? Why hadn’t Grace rung her? Lydie was feeling hot, then cold, then hot again. But she knew the answer to that – when Grace had been with Justin she’d put an emotional distance as well as a physical one between herself and her parents. ‘Don’t tell me she’s dead. Oh, Dad …’

  ‘No, she’s not dead. Calm down. You’re no good to anyone in that state and least of all to yourself. Obviously it’s serious, so the sooner you can get there the better. Cary Hospital. Do you know where that is?’

  ‘Yes, I know it. What did he say, this chap?’

  ‘That her temperature was rising. That’s good. My guess is her temperature had dropped alarmingly but she was over that stage of trauma and it was going up again. Look, we’re wasting time talking. I would have brought your bag down but it was a bit too heavy for me.’

  ‘It’s okay. I’ll get it.’ Lydie dodged past Robert on the narrow path and raced up the three flights of stairs to her room at the top of the house. No time to grab her silver and her tools and her beads. Hurrying back down again she tripped at the bottom of the second flight and took three stairs at once as she landed, almost winded, on the landing.

  Then, out through the kitchen door, down the path to where Robert was holding open the driver’s door for her.

  ‘It’s going to be a waste of my breath telling you not to drive too fast. So all I’ll say is try to do it carefully.’

  And then Robert hugged his daughter to him and kissed her forehead.

  ‘Your hair smells of apples,’ he said. His voice was choked.

  ‘I expect it does,’ Lydie said, surprised, yet pleased beyond belief her father had commented. And yet she felt uncomfortable in his arms at the same time.

  Why in God’s name was her father being tender towards her now? She didn’t know she could cope with it. She wriggled in her father’s arms and he loosened his grasp.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Robert said, placing an arm on Lydie’s shoulder. ‘Too little, too late?’

  He laughed uneasily.

  ‘I’m sorry too,’ Lydie said. ‘About our spat at the hotel, and all the other things we’ve never agreed about.’ She kissed her father’s cheek. ‘I’ll ring as soon as I know anything. And could you ring Ralph? Please.’

  ‘Already have. At least half a dozen times. The house phone and his mobile. Best not to leave a message, eh?’

  ‘No, best not,’ Lydie said. As she gunned the car into life and selected first gear, she wondered just where Ralph might be.

  ‘I want nothing from you.’


  ‘What? The last two hours have been a nothing?’ Ralph laughed. He hoped Marianne wouldn’t want another round, because although the mind was now very willing the flesh was weak. Marianne was looking deliciously dishevelled, her kaftan now on, but twisted slightly across her shoulders showing an enticing patch of milky-white bare skin, and her hair a tumble of curls, still with bits of grass in it in places. And still wearing nothing underneath. Ralph felt a stirring in his loins again.

  ‘No. Not a nothing. It was wonderful. Really wonderful.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘You sound like a little boy who’s just been given his weekly pocket money and a tube of Smarties!’

  ‘It’s how I feel.’ How true that was – to feel desired and wanted and now Marianne was telling him she wanted nothing from him, which he took to mean she didn’t want him to leave his wife, or for there to be regular repeats of this afternoon. Well, what a lucky bugger he was. It was a one-off. A one-night stand. Or in this case a one-afternoon stand. Lads on the building site had boasted about them all the time. Couldn’t even remember the girl’s name afterwards. Or girls. Sometimes up to four or five a night. He’d always thought it selfish behaviour, very base. But now …?

  Ralph tucked his shirt into the waistband of his chinos. The gesture was telling Marianne – he hoped – that it was now over. He would have to make a start for home soon.

  ‘Something to eat? A sandwich? Sardines?’

  ‘I don’t think I have time,’ Ralph said. The tea Marianne had begun to make had never materialised and his stomach was in danger of rumbling.

  ‘Nonsense. Here, you open the sardines. I’ll find some bread.’

  Without protest, Ralph took the can of sardines in tomato sauce. How long could it take to make and eat a sardine sandwich? Would another fifteen minutes or so make any difference? He pulled on the ring-pull, began to ease back the lid, then it snapped, springing back and cutting his thumb.

  ‘Bugger!’

  ‘Oh,’ Marianne said, twisting round from her bread-buttering to look at the blood dripping from Ralph’s hand onto the tiles. ‘Quick, under the tap.’ She grabbed for Ralph’s hand.

  ‘It’s okay, I can do it.’ He knew the offer of a sandwich was another ruse to keep him there a little longer. He had a feeling the bandaging of a cut thumb might go on until midnight the mood Marianne was in.

  ‘What a brave soldier!’ Marianne laughed.

  ‘Yeah. More ways than one to die a hero; cut from a sardine can rates up there with the best of them.’

  Marianne laughed loudly, fruitily, her bosoms bouncing about under the thin fabric of her kaftan.

  ‘You’re good for my soul, Ralph, you know that?’

  ‘I am?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Together Ralph and Marianne assembled the sandwiches and ate them in companionable silence; their eyes meeting, locking, smiling.

  Marianne ran the tip of her tongue around her lips to cleanse them.

  Time to go Ralphie, boy, Ralph told himself.

  ‘That was lovely. The rather late lunch, I mean. And the rest of it.’

  ‘Thank you for having me comes next for the party boy.’

  ‘That too,’ Ralph said.

  ‘You’re definitely going?’

  ‘I think I must.’

  ‘I like you, Ralph, really like you.’

  What was he supposed to say now? Not that he loved her surely? She’d already told him she wanted nothing from him, which he took to mean any sort of permanent relationship. He felt Marianne’s hand ruffling the hair on the back of his head. He knew it wouldn’t take much for him to undress all over again, make love to her all over again although she was more than capable of taking the lead, which was a revelation to Ralph. He’d never had sex in so many positions, so many times, with such satisfactory results, in his life before. Is this what hard drugs were like? One shot and you were forever in their thrall?

  ‘It was pretty good for me too,’ Ralph said a little unsteadily. Never one for heartburn he seemed to have it now. He gave his chest an exploratory rub. ‘But probably no repeats.’

  ‘Probably?’

  ‘The best I can do. I have a business to run. I can’t keep driving all this way just because you need a good …’ Ralph was about to say fuck but couldn’t. It was a word that was used in almost every sentence on a building site and in every film he’d seen on TV lately, but Ralph didn’t talk dirty.

  ‘Fuck? Go on, say it, Ralph. F-U-C-K. It’s a good word. From the Irish foeck, meaning to make love, procreate.’

  ‘Well, let’s hope we haven’t done the last bit.’

  ‘Hmmm,’ Marianne said. ‘I’m a naturally earthy woman and go with the rhythm of my cycle.’

  ‘Good.’

  Ralph checked that his credit card wallet was in the pocket of his shirt and not still sitting on Marianne’s kitchen table, a lure for future pleasures.

  ‘You’re such an innocent, Ralph,’ Marianne laughed. ‘I can read you so easily. You think I lifted that, don’t you? That I had to have a reason for you to come back because I fancied the pants off you the first time I saw you.’

  Ralph held up his hands in mock submission.

  ‘Okay, okay, yes, I did think that. I also couldn’t think why.’

  ‘You are a very attractive man. Scrumptious in fact. Very Robert Redford when he was in his heyday. For the record I think it’s the greatest crime ever committed against me in this life that you are married, and that you are also basically very decent and honest, and that I’m not going to be able to persuade you into a torrid and mutually satisfying affair.’

  ‘You drive a hard bargain! But you forget I’m a businessman. Now, the nudes. Do I take them, or not? If I do then I will have to fight off Margot Bartlett for starters, and it’s going to be a hard fight.’

  Marianne’s hand was now resting lightly on his shoulder, her fingers ever so slightly caressing and smoothing the fabric of his shirt. He knew just what those fingers could do. Although there was plenty of light left he wanted to get back before dusk. He’d already discovered that not every crossroads in this part of Devon had a signpost. He didn’t want to get lost.

  ‘One more time?’ Marianne asked.

  She kissed Ralph’s neck just below his ear. Up until that moment Ralph hadn’t realised he had an erogenous zone, but he did now. As Marianne’s lips moved and sucked on his neck, Ralph felt fear rising. Not a love-bite? Not at his age! He’d had one of those once and his mother had scrubbed his neck with a wire brush and Lifebuoy soap.

  ‘Hey! I can’t go home with written evidence of this!’

  ‘You don’t have to go home. You could stop here.’

  ‘What would Robert Redford do?’ he asked.

  ‘In real life I have no idea. On film, I suspect that to draw out the delight and the promise and the wantonness he would walk away this time. Then he’d think things over, remember the feel and the touch of the woman, her comfort and her willingness to love him. And then he’d come creeping back.’

  Marianne raised her head to look up at Ralph and then kissed him long and slow. Ralph, pulling them both to a standing position, kissed her back. He ran his fingers through Marianne’s curls, pulled her head down gently onto his shoulder.

  ‘And then?’ he asked, his voice muffled in her hair.

  ‘And then she’d be waiting.’

  Ralph didn’t want the spell to end.

  ‘I’ll be back. I feel as if a part of me will always be here.’

  ‘I know. Now go.’

  Ralph walked back down the drive to his car. His mobile was ringing in his jacket pocket again. How many times was that now? At least six times he’d heard it ringing and no doubt there had been others when his mind had been somewhere else.

  But by the time he’d stowed Marianne’s paintings in the boot of his car it had stopped ringing. Good. Ralph couldn’t think of a single person he wanted to speak to. Not even Lydie. Not even Grace.

  Ch
apter Fifteen

  ‘Of course you and Amy can move in with me. Goodness, isn’t this house far too big for one?’ Drew’s mother had been unable to keep the delight at having her ‘boy’ back under her roof.

  ‘Just ‘til I get things sorted for Amy. An operation perhaps. Thanks.’

  But Drew had a feeling it would be a long, long time before he left. What a backward step, going back to live with your mother, whatever the circumstances had been that had caused it.

  ‘Okay, Mum, thanks,’ Drew said, ending his call to his mother. ‘Hug Amy for me.’

  He’d promised Jonty he’d keep an eye on Becca. It was eerily quiet as he opened the door into the flat.

  ‘Becca, it’s Drew,’ he called quietly so as not to alarm her. Jonty had told him once that he kept all the knives locked up in case Becca went on a rampage. Obviously he’d left one out somewhere or Becca had broken into the knife drawer because she sure as hell had had one in her hand earlier. He hoped there wasn’t so much as a butter knife to hand now because he’d have no hesitation in using it on her if she flew at him.

  No answer.

  ‘It’s Drew,’ he called again.

  ‘Go away.’ Becca’s voice, very girlie, very childlike.

  Drew ignored her. The sound was coming from the sitting room so he walked on through, stopping stock still with shock when he saw Becca sitting in the window seat with what looked like a baby in her arms, rocking it, crooning to it.

  ‘Go away!’ Becca yelled, more forcefully this time.

  ‘Jonty said I had to stay with you so I’m staying.’

  He started to move forwards slowly, stealthily like a cat. There was no way he could risk that not being a real baby. He knew Becca was capable of anything now. She could have gone into the market and stolen a baby from a pram or a pushchair.

  ‘Emma doesn’t want you to.’

  ‘Emma? Your baby’s called Emma?’ This was like playing with Amy, only surreal. Drew inched nearer. God, that looks like real hair. She’d only gone and kidnapped a baby, hadn’t she? And from what he could tell from a brief glance at the piles of baby clothes on the floor by Becca’s feet she’d been planning it for ages. ‘Can I see her?’ he asked. ‘I’ve got a little girl, you know. She’s called Amy.’