by Jo Verity
‘Anna?’
‘What?’
‘You did find them, didn’t you? The earrings?’
Trapped in the moving car, there was no escape and no way of side stepping his question. There were several answers she might give but no time to reflect on the repercussions associated with each. Three responses came to mind:
A. No, I did not find any earrings
B. They’re lovely but I’ve mislaid them.
C. They’re lovely. I’m keeping them for special occasions.
She chose B. ‘Yes. In with my clay. They’re beautiful.’
‘I was a bit surprised that you didn’t mention them.’
‘I know. I’ve been feeling dreadful about it.’ That was true, anyway. ‘You see … When I found them, I put them in my pocket. But I had to pop back to the garden. I’d left something. My cardigan. Then I got side-tracked and …did a bit of weeding. By the time I got back to the house and remembered them, they’d disappeared. They must have slipped out of my pocket when I bent over.’ It wasn’t totally inaccurate.
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘I didn’t want to upset you. And I was sure they’d turn up. We can have a proper look as soon as we get back.’ She fastened the beads around her neck. ‘At least these are safe. Thank you, love.’ She lent across and kissed his morning-smooth cheek.
They made good time and were pulling up at Flora’s door half-an-hour ahead of schedule. They rang the bell and waited.
Tom jiggled the loose change in his trouser pocket. ‘Bet she’s forgotten we’re coming.’
There was the sound of footsteps coming down the hall and Flora opened the door. ‘Mum. Dad. You’re bright and early. I thought you said about ten-thirty.’ They exchanged hugs. ‘Nice necklace, Mum.’ The sound of running water came from somewhere in the flat. Flora, face flushed, was quick to explain, ‘Luke’s here. Come on in.’
‘Luke. That’s nice,’ Anna said.
‘He wanted to be sure to see you. So he came round really early. Didn’t you?’ Flora addressed the last sentence to Luke, who emerged from the bathroom, wearing jeans and an old sweatshirt. His feet were bare and he smelled of toothpaste.
‘Hi, Auntie Anna. Uncle Tom.’ He’d dropped the titles years ago but this morning, for some reason, he reverted to childhood nomenclature.
Tom shook hands with the lanky young man whom they’d known since he was four, and Anna kissed him. Flora, also barefoot, led them through to the kitchen. Remnants of last-night’s meal, including an empty champagne bottle, stood on the work-top.
They breakfasted on coffee and croissants which Luke fetched from the bakery a few doors away. They chatted about Sidmouth and then the conversation turned to Pen Craig.
‘How’s life in the commune?’ asked Luke.
‘Fine,’ said Anna. They’d given up explaining that there was nothing communal about it.
‘We’re a bit worried about your Dad, though,’ said Tom. She kicked him under the table.
‘In what way “worried”?’ Luke asked.
She glared at Tom. It left her no alternative but to tell them that Sally wasn’t at Pen Craig at the moment. ‘It’s just a tiff that got out of hand. I’m sure they’ll work it out.’
‘Mmmm. Mum’s never actually walked out before. D’you think I should come up?’
‘Couldn’t you phone Carol and at least check she’s OK?’ said Flora.
Luke said he would think about it. ‘I don’t want to involve more people than necessary. It’s between the two of them and at least Dad’s got plenty of people to keep an eye out for him.’
‘And what about you two?’ asked Anna, brightly. ‘Any news?’
Flora was thinking of redecorating the flat and buying some new furniture. They discussed the pros and cons of stripped floorboards and free-standing wardrobes. ‘Oh, and I called to see Grandpa last week. To tell the truth, I was hoping to meet the mysterious Dorothy. But there was no sign of him, so I just pushed a note through the door.’
Attention turned to Luke and his plans for the future. ‘I might try and get a place at law school, if I can rustle up the money to fund it.’
‘Your mother will be pleased,’ said Anna.
‘That’s probably why I haven’t done it already.’
Anna went to the lavatory, taking the opportunity to snoop around the bathroom. There were several toothbrushes in the mug and a pack of disposable razors on the shelf. Inconclusive evidence. Convincing herself that she needed an aspirin, she opened the medicine cabinet. A bottle of aftershave sat at the back of the shelf, behind the shampoo and cough mixture. Up until last Christmas, Flora had been seeing a young man called Angus. Angus had a beard.
After another coffee and some advice from Tom on dealing with a damp patch under the sink, they left.
‘Luke’s a nice lad,’ said Tom, as they pulled away.
‘He’d obviously been there all night,’ said Anna.
‘How do you mean?’
‘I think we almost caught them out.’
‘Really?’
It was mid-day and the roads had become congested with Bank Holiday traffic. Tom concentrated on driving whilst she pondered.
She started with the earrings. If they recruited everyone to help with the search, it was possible that they might turn up, regardless of the circumstances of their disappearance. She wasn’t sure how Tom would take it if they didn’t. But he was still making amends for his own fall from grace, so he couldn’t afford to be too cross with her for losing them.
On to Flora with her pink cheeks and champagne bottle. If she and Luke had embarked on a liaison, it was odd that they should keep it secret. She and Sally had often talked about the possibility of romance between their older children but had reached the conclusion that the youngsters might consider it tantamount to incest. But there was no doubt about it, Flora’s cheeks and the time it had taken to answer the door were pretty conclusive evidence.
‘Luke certainly had no idea that Sally had gone,’ said Tom.
‘She may be there when we get back,’ said Anna, without conviction.
Anna had warned her father to expect them for lunch. She’d suggested that they go out to eat but he wasn’t keen and offered to provide beans on toast, with ice-cream to follow.
When they reached the house, Steven’s car was parked in the drive.
‘Steven and Elaine are here,’ her father announced when he opened the door. ‘We’re in the garden.’ Her mother had been the demonstrative one and now visitors received little by way of a welcome. Tom might be the same, if he were left to deal with the world on his own.
They followed Frank through the house and out of the back door. Strange, but today the familiar smell was absent, maybe because all the windows were open. Everything looked spick and span. The tea towels were folded neatly on the rail by the cooker and there was a vase of flowers on the sill.
Steven and Elaine were outside, perched on the upright chairs from the kitchen, and there were four empty chairs. All it needed was a table piled with old magazines and it could have been a doctor’s waiting room. What had her father done with the nice set of garden furniture they’d bought him last summer? So many of their gifts disappeared without trace.
‘This is a nice surprise,’ Anna bent to kiss her brother and then his wife. Elaine’s hair was stiff and scratchy as it grazed her forehead. Her sister-in-law was a redhead but, at this proximity, she could detect a tell-tale white root at the base of each hair.
Steven was good-looking in a filmstar-ish way. When they were youngsters, she’d been convinced that they’d been allocated the wrong genders. Whilst Steven had long eyelashes and beautiful teeth, she battled against unruly hair and large feet. His baby-face and mild manners made him appealing and all her teenage friends had mooned around after him. In fact, many of them were friendly with her because they fancied her brother.
During his student days Steven had brought home a string of interesting girlfriends wit
h exotic names – Vivienne, Francesca, Charlotte. The most fascinating to her had been a Danish girl called Dagmar. Dagmar had hairy armpits and smoked but, more exciting than that, she didn’t wear a bra. When she wore t-shirts, her erect nipples stood out for all to see. Anna wasn’t sure what her mother and father had made of this, but after a few months Dagmar returned to Copenhagen and was replaced by a Scottish girl called Fiona, who was flat-chested.
After such a promising start, her brother’s eventual choice of a wife had been a great disappointment. Elaine worked at the bank and had set her cap at Steven when he opened an account there, depositing his first month’s salary. She was glamorous but conventional; maybe what Steven needed, to promote his career, was a presentable wife who could make small-talk and shaved her armpits. While all this was going on, Anna slipped away to art college and cultivated her very own underarm hair.
They sat on the dining chairs while Frank went to make coffee. He looked edgy but refused Anna’s offer of help. She was glad because it gave her an opportunity for a few minutes alone with Steven, and they wandered around the garden, pretending to inspect the borders. ‘What’s going on?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know. He phoned yesterday. Invited us to lunch. I persuaded Elaine to come, on condition we only stayed a couple of hours.’
‘Something’s up. Haven’t you noticed how tidy the kitchen is?’
‘We’ll find out soon enough.’
They rejoined Tom and Elaine, who were sitting in silence. Elaine looked at her watch and gave a theatrical sigh, tapping the toe of her gold and bronze sandal on the crazy paving.
‘I’ll give Dad a hand,’ Anna said, eager to escape.
In the kitchen her father was opening a second tin of baked beans. She imagined him, day after day, there on his own, turning out his modest meals and she rubbed her hand on his back, hoping that he felt the love in her touch.
‘We’ll have it in here,’ he said.
‘Fine. I’ll tell them to bring their chairs in.’
The kitchen was filled with people and the smell of burning toast. As they were putting the food on the plates, Frank went into the hall and shouted up the stairs. ‘Dorothy. Lunch is ready.’
Anna glanced at Steven. He shrugged and shook his head. Tom took an extra set of cutlery from the drawer. Elaine stifled a giggle. Frank came back into the kitchen and, chin raised, glared at them. They heard the slow thud, thud, thud of someone struggling down the stairs. ‘What’s the matter?’ he asked.
They resumed their tasks, adding theatrical embellishments to cover the confusion. Tom whistled. Anna and Steven chatted, noisily, about a family friend. When Dorothy made her entrance they were casual with their greetings, as though she were someone they saw every day of the week.
There was something different about her. She was thinner than Anna had remembered, more frail. Her white hair was pinned back in a bun at the nape of her neck. On this occasion, too, she wore a white shirt and a long cotton skirt, giving her the air of a retired headmistress or perhaps a writer. Frank went to Dorothy’s side and put his arm around her, drawing her into the family circle. He was tender with her. Dorothy leaned a cheek against his hand, curled around her shoulder. The gold signet ring on his third finger, as much part of Anna’s childhood as the ornaments on the mantelpiece, had been replaced by a wide gold band. A wedding ring, shiny and unscratched. Her eyes darted to Dorothy’s left hand but it was hidden in the folds of her skirt.
Her brother was concentrating on a pan of scrambled eggs and, with all of them crowded into the small kitchen, it was impossible to get near him. Her seat was next to Elaine’s but Elaine was the last person she would choose to confide in. Tom, spotting her agitation, mouthed ‘You OK?’ But she should tell Steven, before anyone else, about the ring.
The crush and disorganisation around the table distracted attention from the stranger in their midst. Whilst they ate, Anna took a closer look at Dorothy. It was six weeks since their only meeting and, in the intervening time, she’d often thought about the old lady. She had a good visual memory but was surprised to realise how inaccurately she had fixed Dorothy in her mind. Her face was thinner than she’d remembered and this was not at all the self-confident woman whom she had watched plodding up to the front door.
‘That’s a very colourful necklace, Anna.’ Elaine’s voice broke in. ‘Just your sort of thing.’ She was accustomed to condescension from her sister-in-law. Elaine always managed to make her feel like an inadequate child, needing approval. When she was younger, exhausted with children and work, this tactic had succeeded but now she felt sorry for her sister-in-law, glamour fading and no children to love and worry about. Elaine had always been the centre of her own limited world and self-obsession had become her defining characteristic.
‘Yes, it’s lovely isn’t it? Tom gave it to me this morning.’
Tom, who had been peering at his food, looked up when he heard his name. ‘We’re going to try and find the matching earrings, aren’t we, love?’
The scrambled eggs were overcooked and the toast burnt. For pudding, and despite her father’s protestations, Anna opened both tins of fruit salad, serving them with a generous scoop of vanilla ice cream. Throughout, she kept an eye Dorothy’s left hand. There were several rings on her third finger, not unusual in a woman who had lived so long.
After they’d finished, they washed up. Anna had given up trying to communicate her suspicions to her brother for the time being and, as she dried the plates, watched Tom through the window, taking rubbish to the dustbin. He turned, conscious of her scrutiny, and mouthed a kiss.
They made coffee and took it into the sitting room. During the manoeuvres, she found herself alone in the kitchen with Steven. ‘They’re married,’ she whispered.
‘Who?’
‘Dad and Dorothy. He’s wearing a new ring.’
‘That doesn’t mean…’
‘I think it does.’
Frank settled Dorothy in his armchair and drew up a dining chair alongside her. He sat, straight-backed, cup balanced on hand, bony knees sharp through his pale cotton trousers. He looked tense. As soon as they were all there, he cleared his throat and tapped his spoon against his cup. Elaine sighed and fluttered her eyes at the ceiling.
‘It’s not often that I have the pleasure of seeing you all together, so this is probably as good a time as any to make my announcement. Dorothy and I are man and wife.’
As soon as he tapped the cup, Anna had fixed her eyes on Dorothy’s face. She spotted the tiniest of smiles, lifting the corners of her new stepmother’s mouth. It was a smile not of triumph, but of tender indulgence.
‘Congratulations.’ Tom was first to break the silence, then the others joined in with their best wishes. Anna, overcome with an emotion she couldn’t identify, went across to hug her father and kiss his bride.
‘You’re a sly one,’ said Elaine.
‘When did this happen?’ demanded Steven.
‘Two weeks ago. We know you’re all busy people, with far more interesting things to do, so we decided not to bother you with it.’ Was there a hint of victory in Frank’s voice?
‘It all seems a bit…’ Steven looked unhappy.
Anna intervened. ‘Well I think it’s very romantic. I suppose it’s a bit like eloping without the bother of going anywhere.’
‘We did go away, actually.’ Dorothy’s voice was quiet but assured. ‘We went to Torquay. I expect your father mentioned that we were going away for a few days.’
In fact he hadn’t, but neither Anna nor Steven had attempted to get in touch with him during that time, and his absence went unnoticed.
‘Any more questions?’ asked Frank, lifting his chin defiantly. ‘No? I think we should call it a day then, don’t you?’
Steven followed Anna into the kitchen with the dirty cups. ‘He’s doing it to spite us.’
‘Done it. He’s done it.’
Steven ignored her. ‘Poor Mum must be…’
‘Pl
ease, Steve. I don’t really want to think about Mum. It doesn’t help.’
‘And I can’t make her out at all. What’s the attraction?’
Elaine leaned around the door and tapped the face of her watch, then disappeared, without saying a word. Steve grimaced and dried his hands. ‘I’ll ring you in a few days. You really should get email sorted out.’
‘Tom’s not keen.’
‘Tom’s a Luddite.’
‘Tom loves machinery. He’s not enamoured with IT, if that’s what you mean.’
They gathered in the drive, all except Dorothy who had remained in the sitting room. Elaine got into the car and shut the door. Anna hugged her father. For a moment, when he looked at her, his face softened and she wished that they were alone and able to talk.
‘Perhaps you and Dorothy can come to Pen Craig soon,’ she said.
‘Perhaps.’
As they drove away she could see them both, waving from the window.
16
Sally had been back at Pen Craig for a few days. Anna, pinning up the latest drawing from Arthur, spotted her heading towards her car. She grabbed a stack of newspapers and hurried outside.
‘Hi, stranger.’ She dumped the paper in the recycling bin.
Sally looked tired and unusually scruffy. ‘I’m just popping down to the village. We’ve run out of everything but I can’t be bothered to go to Tesco. How are you? And your lot?’
‘I’m fine. My father managed to get married without anyone noticing.’
‘Good for him. But you knew it was on the cards.’
‘Yes, but I suppose I imagined I’d be involved, in some way. And the other thing is, I think your son and my daughter may be seeing each other. Dreadful expression.’ She explained the reasons for her suspicions. ‘Have you spoken to Luke recently?’
‘No. It’s been … difficult.’ Sally paused. ‘I assume you’re talking about Flora.’
Anna laughed. ‘Don’t worry, Maddy’s still safely attached to Taliesin.’ She waited for a second before asking, ‘Time for a coffee? Tom’s gone to see a client.’