Now, a few years wiser and what felt like a hundred years older, she had the “don’t give me any crap” glare down to perfection. After a few prompts, he told his story – with a scattering of “it wasn’t my faults” and “it got a bit out of hands” thrown in. He didn’t even look like he believed them himself, and she certainly didn’t. Robbie was trouble, always had been – but Patrick didn’t need his help to find it. He’d vandalised an innocent man’s property for petty kicks, and now seemed to be trying to convince himself he was blameless. She clung to that thought – that the act was as much for his own conscience as hers. At least that would mean he had one.
At the end of it, she looked at him, then looked at Ben, who’d stayed quiet apart from a few salient questions.
“What do you think we should do, Ben?” she asked. She had her own opinions on that, but as one of the top legal minds in the country was sitting in her front room, she might as well make use of him.
“I think,” he said slowly, “that we need to pay a visit to Mr Jensen.”
Chapter 5
“I knew your grandfather,” said Mr Jensen, after they’d all settled in for cups of tea.
They’d found him sweeping glass out of his driveway, surrounded by black plastic bin bags as he tried to sort out some of the chaos Patrick and Robbie had caused in his garden. He’d taken one look at them – Pippa doing her best to smile, Ben politely introducing himself and Patrick mumbling apologies – and invited them in. His wife had died years earlier, but despite his advanced age he kept his house as neat as a pin.
“Really?” said Ben. “He passed away a few years ago.”
“I know that,” replied Mr Jensen. “It was the banks that did for him. He was never the same after he lost the farm. Only in his late eighties as well – a waste of a man.”
Pippa held back a smile, amused despite the circumstances – maybe when she reached that age, she’d think of late eighties as being young as well. Although the way Patrick was going, she’d never make it that far. She’d pop her clogs from sheer shock well before she got her bus pass.
She also wondered why she hadn’t heard more about Ben’s grandfather dying. The tone of Mr Jensen’s voice and the slight clenching of Ben’s fists told her there was more to that story than either of them was mentioning. This part of Cornwall was a village; if there’d been anything unusual, she would have heard…except, well. If it had happened near the time of the deaths of her parents, there’d only been one story that interested her. Her own.
“Got into a bit of trouble yourself a bit back, didn’t you?” Mr Jensen continued, in that shamelessly blunt way the very old often have, peering at Ben over the edge of his teacup. His eyes were narrowed, hidden in the folds of so many wrinkles you could barely see them. It was a good face, a face that had spent a lot of time outside, crinkled up against the wind.
“I did, Mr Jensen – but I’ve served my time. Paid my debt to society, as they say. Which is what we’re hoping you’ll let Patrick do.”
The old man made a “harrumphing” noise, seeming to ponder it.
“I was about to call the police when you lot turned up. I saw them last night, those two, thinking they’re all clever like. Clever as my septic tank. Suppose you think I’m just an old fuddy duddy with nothing worth saying, don’t you? Do you think I’ve reached the age where I should just shrivel up and die, son, clear a bit of space at the bar?” he said, fixing Patrick with a stare that made him squirm.
“No! And I’m really sorry…I’ll fix all the mess, Mr Jensen. Me and Robbie, we’ll sort it out, I promise. We’d had too much to drink, that’s all. I can’t even remember most of it!”
“Aye. I saw that. Saw you staggering around out there, falling over my garden gnomes as you ran away. And I’ve been in that position myself before now, lad. I wasn’t born this old, you know. I raised a bit of hell myself when I was your age – before I grew up and started raising my own family instead. That’ll calm a man down. Or a woman.”
He stared at them both, and Pippa knew he’d be thinking about their parents. Everyone knew what had happened to them. Everyone knew what she was trying to do. And everyone knew that Patrick was heading for a bad place. It wasn’t uncommon in rural villages for the younger lads to play wild, but he was pushing it too far.
“Please, Mr Jensen,” she added. “Let him make up for it. He’ll pay for the damage to the car as well. I’ll make sure he does. Just don’t call the police – give him another chance.”
“What do you reckon, son?” he asked Ben. “And how did you get mixed up in all this in the first place?”
“I just got lucky, I suppose, Mr Jensen. And I reckon Patrick deserves the chance to make this up to you. Like you said, you’ve been there yourself. Give him the opportunity to show you what he’s made of. You know that if the police get involved, it’ll be bad for him, and for Pippa and the children. Is that something you really want to live with?”
Pippa felt her face pale; Ben had said what she was thinking, but what she hadn’t wanted to say. It was the truth, but it felt too much like emotional blackmail. She’d never played the pity card and didn’t feel entirely comfortable with Ben doing it on her behalf. Unless it worked – then she’d just have to find a way to be comfortable with it.
“I reckon not,” Mr Jensen said after a tense moment passed. “Not yet, anyway. You’re doing a grand job, Pippa, and a hard job. This layabout brother of yours isn’t helping, is he, love? Old enough to know better, he is, and instead he’s got you all upset like this…he should be bloody well ashamed of himself.”
“I am, honest,” muttered Patrick, staring at his boots as intensely as Mr Jensen was staring at him.
“All right,” he finally said. “It’s a deal – but I want this place cleaned up quick smart, and I want a bit of help around the house. The garden. I’m almost ninety now. I could do with a pair of young hands to do the weeding. Twice a week should do to start with. I can tell them stories about my war days while they’re at it.”
He gave her a sly wink as he said it. Wily old coot.
Pippa saw Patrick bridle, about to complain, and gave him a “shut your mouth right now” look. It was a good deal and they took it, leaving Mr Jensen with the promise that Patrick would be back that afternoon – with his partner in crime.
“I’m off, sis,” said Patrick as they stood outside in the pale sunshine. Honey bees hummed around the foxgloves and skylarks were singing over the distant fields. It would have been beautiful, if it hadn’t been marred by her ASBO brother.
“Off where?” she asked harshly, arms crossed over her chest, feeling about a hundred and two.
“Don’t worry – not the pub. It’s not even open yet. I’m off to get some rubble sacks and to find Robbie. And…well, thanks. Both of you. I’ll try not to cock up again too soon.”
For a minute she thought he was going to hug her, but that would have been a detente too far. Instead, he shrugged and strode off down the hill towards the village. Where, indeed, the pub was still closed for another half an hour. She stared after him, noticing how big he’d got. He was turning into a man, physically at least. Eventually he’d leave home, and part of her – part of her she wasn’t proud of – was looking forward to it.
“Come on,” said Ben, putting his arm around her shoulder. “I’m taking you out for lunch.”
“No!” she said, pulling away. “I have to pick the kids up from school!”
“Yes,” he replied, looking at his watch, “in about four hours. I don’t know about you, but I need a pint.”
“He wasn’t always like this,” said Pippa, sipping her orange juice in the beer garden of The Stag. She’d deliberately directed him to a touristy pub well out of the village, free of locals, not wanting to attract any more attention. Not that she expected the paparazzi to leap out of the Cornish hedgerows, but…better safe than sorry. And she certainly didn’t want to run the risk of finding Patrick in the village boozer, toasting her stupidity
and laughing about his close scrape. She really hoped that wasn’t what he was doing, but who knew?
“No?” queried Ben, who was casting his mind back all those years and recalling a younger Patrick, already taciturn and sneaky.
“No. He wasn’t the life and soul of the party, but he was okay. A good kid. We fought like cat and dog even then, but it was all…normal. It was after they died. Our parents. He was only fourteen, and he didn’t know how to cope. It’s not his fault.”
“I’m pretty sure,” replied Ben, “that none of you knew how to cope, Pippa. Scotty must have been a baby. You were only a kid yourself. And the more you keep telling yourself it’s not his fault, the more he’ll keep taking advantage of you.”
Pippa felt anger whip up inside her – what did he know? What did he know about Patrick, and her, and everything they’d gone through? A dozen retorts sprung to mind – all of them variations on “that’s none of your business” – but she bit them back. After all, she’d just made it his business by dragging him into Patrick’s latest escapade. And maybe…maybe he was right. She just didn’t know any more. She’d never had anybody to talk to about it before. She’d become an island and a tsunami was rushing in towards the shore.
“But what about you?” he asked. “Did you always used to be like this? What were you like before the accident? And please don’t tell me you never evolved from dressing up as Rambo and jumping on unsuspecting visitors’ heads…”
“What do you mean, like this?” she asked, gesturing at her tattered jeans and wild hair. “I’ve always been this well groomed! I know I look like a mess – in fact I am a mess – but there never seems to be the time for anything more than brushing my teeth and falling into bed.”
“That’s not what I meant, no,” he said, reaching out to place a hand over hers on the gnarled wooden tabletop. “And you look just fine. Better than fine. What I meant was, what were you going to do? If everything had gone to plan?”
“Ah. Gone to plan,” she said, distracted by the feel of his skin on hers. Even the mildest of touches sent a flush into her cheeks, which she desperately tried to ignore. It was embarrassing apart from anything else.
“Well, I suppose I would have gone off to Oxford, where I had a place to study history. After that, who knows? Maybe teaching? Maybe archaeology? I always quite liked the thought of scrabbling around in the mud for a living…which is kind of what I do now, but without the priceless artefacts. Unless there’s a secret Roman hoard lying underneath Bottom Paddock. That would be nice. It was that summer they died – the one between doing my A levels and going to uni. There wasn’t any family, apart from some cousins in Canada, so I didn’t have much of an alternative. Either I stayed or the kids went off into foster care. And really, can you imagine anyone wanting to take Patrick on without having to?”
She was joking, trying to make light of it, he knew. But he couldn’t imagine how hard it must have been – for a girl who was obviously so bright, with her whole future ahead of her, to face that kind of decision. He’d spent years in court listening to sob stories about youths from broken homes, who used dysfunctional parents as an excuse for stealing cars and ram-raiding supermarkets. Yet she’d shown the strength of will to stay, to care for the tribe, to try and make it work. No wonder she didn’t have time to get her nails done.
He found himself twining his fingers closer into hers, not wanting to break the connection. Her nails might be short and uncared for, but they were attached to her hands, her arms, her body. That crazy hair and the curves he could see outlined beneath her top. The whole package. He looked at her and wanted her – the way he’d never expected to want a woman again. He needed his head examining and briefly considered banging it against the wooden tabletop to try and knock some sense back into it.
“You did the right thing,” he said. “But not the easy thing. Maybe you should give yourself a break? Even professional parents get things wrong sometimes. And the twins and Scotty seem like delightful kids. Patrick? Well, he’s almost a grown man. There’s only so much you can do.”
Pippa looked into his eyes, feeling herself suddenly short of breath. They were surrounded by people and yet she felt as though they were alone. The only two survivors in the war of life. What would it be like, she wondered, to just lean forward and kiss him? He’d probably fall backwards off the bench and clonk his head on the next table.
“You’re very wise, Mr Retallick,” she said, “for one so young.”
“Ha! I’m a lot older than you, Miss Harte, thanks for reminding me. And I’m not wise – look at the mess I made of my own life. A criminal record, no career, no wife, no family. I don’t think I’d win any prizes, do you?”
“I don’t know,” she answered, a wicked grin creasing her face, “depends what kind of competition you were entering. There’s a few farm shows around here where you can win rosettes for prize stud…”
“Are you flirting with me?” he asked, suddenly aware of an embarrassing reaction in his jeans. Down, boy, he told it. She’s just flirting – not asking you out for kicks and giggles.
“Flirting…why, I think I just might be,” she answered, a look of fake shock on her face. “It’s been so long I barely recognised it. And I’m sorry if it makes you feel a bit sick, but it’s your own fault. You’re holding my hand and I did notice you were sniffing my hair earlier. That’s asking for trouble, really, isn’t it? I’m very out of practice, though, so I apologise for my lack of finesse. That’s another thing I haven’t had time for.”
“Flirting?” he said, aware she was trying to lighten the tone. Avoid the big subjects – and who could blame her? Wasn’t flirting a lot more fun than pondering death and disaster? Maybe she needed the distraction. Maybe he did too…
“Men in general. I haven’t had a boyfriend since I was seventeen, and he wasn’t up to much either. Although he did brew his own scrumpy, which was a definite plus point back then. In fact it probably explained why he was my boyfriend at all. What about you? You had a fiancée, you said? What happened? Why aren’t you happily married and pumping out little Retallicks?”
“I would have been,” he said, gently removing his hand from hers. “But she had different ideas. It appeared that life with a convict was not to Johanna’s taste and she moved on.”
“Just like that?” said Pippa, feeling her senses deflate now that his fingers were no longer entwined with hers.
“Just like that. We’d been engaged for over a year and the wedding was set for the October. But she, and her family, decided that I was no longer acceptable. No longer up to scratch. It wasn’t about money – I had plenty saved up, and there was always the back-up plan of writing the book – it was about me. I didn’t fit the profile any more.”
“But that’s crazy! You hadn’t changed – you were the same person you always were, the same person she fell in love with in the first place!”
Ben laughed, but it was a sound devoid of humour. He was reminded again that despite her strength of character, Pippa Harte was still very young – and he needed to remember that. She was just a girl, no matter how much he enjoyed flirting with her. She’d suffered, but she’d never had her heart broken. Never felt that slap of rejection when everything you thought you knew about somebody turned out to be a pack of lies. He hoped she never would – because it meant you could never quite see relationships in the same way again.
“I’m not sure what she fell in love with, to be honest. Or what I fell in love with, either. I was different then…and if I’m honest, I think Johanna was part of a lifestyle deal. I had the big job. The flash car. The social life. When I met her she seemed perfect and I fell in love with her. Or at least I thought I did. Now – and believe me, you get a lot of thinking time in prison – I think I fell in love with idea of her, of us. We worked as a couple. She fitted my profile just as much as I fitted hers. It’s entirely possible I was just as shallow as she was.”
“I don’t believe that for a minute,” said Pippa, wrin
kling her nose up in a scowl. “If the roles had been reversed, you’d have stuck by her, wouldn’t you?”
“I’ve thought about that one a lot, funnily enough,” he replied. “And yes, I would. But she didn’t stick by me, and this was the woman I intended to spend the rest of my life with – which says a lot about my taste in women, doesn’t it? Anyway. Enough. That’s water under the bridge. She’s gone and since then there’s not been anyone else. Even though I did get a few marriage proposals from women in their fifties while I was in jail, as well as the occasional man. Strangely enough I wasn’t tempted – and I can’t see it ever happening now. Me and women are a thing of the past.”
“Well that’s just silly,” she said, frowning at him. “How can you say that? You’re only young. You can’t condemn yourself to being single for the rest of your life just because of one dud. You might meet someone else – someone wonderful.”
“I might,” he agreed, nodding. “But I don’t think I could ever trust anyone else. And without that, really, what do I have to offer? Like I said, I’m no prize. Flirting – and it’s been very nice, thank you – is as far as it goes for me and the fairer sex, at least at this stage.”
There was a beat, a pause, as they both weighed up the statement he’d just made. It was a declaration, of sorts. A line that they couldn’t – shouldn’t – cross. A statement of intent for both of them.
“What a shame,” Pippa replied, chewing her lower lip, thoughtfully. “And here was me, imagining the two of us going at it like bunny rabbits for the rest of the afternoon.”
Pippa's Cornish Dream Page 5