‘Can’t I have tarot?’ Melanie pleaded.
‘You’re too young,’ Madame Katarina said severely. Melanie leaned forward as the cards went down.
‘Am I coming back?’ she asked keenly.
Madame Katarina looked round the circle of playing cards. She studied them again, and shrugged.
‘I’m not,’ moaned Melanie. ‘I’m not, am I?’
‘You’re not going,’ said Madame Katarina.
‘I’m on the train tomorrow!’ cried Melanie.
‘Not according to the cards. Very soon, someone is coming to you. Someone close.’
‘I’m not going back?’ Melanie asked, excitement mounting.
‘No – I don’t think so.’
Melanie stood up. ‘Thanks, Madame Katarina – got to get back.’
She glared at the astonished faces in the restaurant, saying fiercely, ‘I’m not going back! I’m not! Madame Katarina says I’m not!’
And, for a time at least, she didn’t.
25
Poor Ruth
Madame Katarina was right. Melanie did not catch the four-twenty train to York because at nine the next morning, after Annie had gone to open the snack bar, Jenny Pickering rang up.
‘Melanie, love,’ her mother began tentatively.
Melanie began to whine. ‘Mum – have I got—?’
Her mother’s voice was serious. ‘Melanie,’ she said heavily. ‘Melanie – pay attention. The police have been round. Ruth’s been found. She’s in St Thomas’s Hospital, in London.’
‘What’s the matter with her?’
‘Bad pneumonia. Double pneumonia. She’s very ill. She’s been sleeping rough.’ Melanie knew her mother was suppressing panic. ‘I don’t know what’s been happening to her. Melanie – now listen. Don’t get on the train this afternoon. We’re coming down this morning. We’ll be in London by dinnertime. Does your friend Annie’s invitation still stand – we’ll need somewhere to stay?’
‘Yes, Mum – yes,’ said Melanie.
Her mother’s voice went on. ‘She’s safe, thank God. Now – can you meet the train – the one ten, King’s Cross. We’ll go straight to the hospital. Can you get some little things – flowers and sweets and all that—’
‘She’s not going to die, is she, Mum?’ burst out Melanie. There was a note in her mother’s voice which frightened her. Her mother said, ‘No – no. I don’t think she’ll die, Melanie.’ Then there was a cry of ‘Mum’. Melanie recognised her brother’s voice, and Jenny Pickering said hastily, ‘We’re not packed properly and the cab’s due soon. Bye love, see you. One ten. Don’t forget.’
Melanie was left staring at the receiver in her hand. She put it back on the cradle, stared at the fireplace and gave a great sob. She ran upstairs, crying, put on her clothes and ran over the road. She rang Vanessa’s bell wildly.
‘What’s the matter?’ said Vanessa, opening the door in jeans and a T-shirt, a piece of toast in her hand. She took Melanie in her arms. ‘I know it’s awful. We aren’t half going to miss you—’
Melanie was gasping out, ‘Ruth. It’s Ruth.’
‘Ruth? – What – your sister?’ exclaimed Vanessa, stepping back. ‘Come in. What’s happened?’
Joanne and Alec were now standing in the hall staring. ‘Go and finish your breakfast, you two,’ ordered Vanessa. ‘Here, calm down, Melanie, and tell me.’
Melanie sat at the kitchen table and explained. ‘Well,’ said Vanessa, ‘we’d better ring up the hospital and find out how she is. Then you’d better buzz off and get some flowers and fruit and orange juice and all that.’ She got the phone and telephone book.
‘Who’s in hospital?’ asked Joanne, coming in.
‘My sister,’ said Melanie.
‘That why you’re crying?’
‘Shut up, Joanne,’ Vanessa ordered, tapping out the number.
‘I don’t want to go and see the hospital,’ said Alec, who had been to visit his grandfather in hospital a month earlier and been threatened by his grandmother that if he didn’t behave they’d leave him behind when they went home.
Melanie spoke to the ward sister, who told her Ruth was a little better. Then there was a pause. The nurse came back to the phone. ‘Sister wants to be sure your mother sees her when she comes in. It’s important. Please tell her.’
Melanie put the phone down looking worried. ‘What’s going on?’ she wondered.
Vanessa told her it was routine. ‘Hop off and get the things she wants,’ she advised. ‘Got some money? Dinner at the Arcadia tonight. I’m on. I’ll do something special. What do they like?’
‘Roast turkey and all the trimmings,’ Melanie said. She went to the door, turned, and said, ‘You never believed Madame Katarina when she said I wasn’t going, did you?’
‘I never said I didn’t,’ Vanessa told her. ‘That was the others. I’m the uneducated one – I don’t have to act sceptical.’
‘You’re wise,’ Melanie told her, and went out.
‘Is Ruth the sister who ran away?’ enquired Joanne, when Melanie had gone.
‘That’s right. Now she’s ill in hospital. That’s a lesson for you,’ said her mother.
‘I wish you hadn’t run away like that,’ Melanie told her sister. ‘What made you do it? Now look at you.’
Ruth Pickering lay flat in a ward full of women, her round face very pale on the pillow. Melanie sat beside her. The two Pickering boys, Colum and John, sat at the other side of the bed in their best clothes, sobered by the journey and the visit to the hospital.
‘You ran away,’ Ruth whispered. ‘So don’t lecture me. You know what Dad’s like.’
Melanie was worried by her sister’s pallor and evident illness, but more by her eyes, big and brown like her own, but now somehow staring, ever-terrified like an actress in a horror film. Frightened, she asked the face on the pillow, ‘What happened to you, Ruth? Was it something bad? Don’t you want to talk about it?’
‘I can’t,’ Ruth said, but Melanie didn’t know whether it was really impossible for her to tell, or just the presence of Colum and John which prevented her.
‘Whatever it was, it wasn’t much fun,’ Melanie said.
‘It seems like an adventure at first, making a big decision and sticking to it, going somewhere big and trying to make it on your own,’ Ruth said. She stopped.
‘You tired? Do you want us to go away?’ Melanie asked.
‘No. Just hold my hand,’ Ruth said. ‘And don’t keep on kicking the bed, Col.’ Colum stopped. They all sat in silence. Colum’s and John’s eyes darted round the ward.
‘There’s Mum,’ said John.
Mrs Pickering, at the other end of the ward, was standing with a doctor and the ward sister. The doctor hurried off and the ward sister beside her spoke to her rapidly. She was nodding. A small woman, with lines on her face and the same large dark eyes as Melanie and Ruth, and John also, Jenny Pickering was wearing her good grey suit and high-heeled shoes. She came over with the nurse. They both looked very serious, and Melanie and her brothers recognised instantly a look on their mother’s face which meant something very bad was happening, like Grandfather’s cancer operation and death or the morning she had told them Ruth was gone and no one knew where she was.
Melanie thought the nurse and doctor had told her mother Ruth was going to die, and burst into tears.
‘What’s the matter?’ asked the sister, but she couldn’t explain, not in front of Ruth and her brothers. ‘So we’ll be seeing you tomorrow morning, Mrs Pickering,’ the sister said in a firm voice. Jenny Pickering nodded.
Then they parted from Ruth, who nodded weakly as they spoke to her, and left.
‘I’ll go back alone tonight to visit her,’ announced Melanie’s mother as they got into the lift. ‘Blow your nose, Melanie. I don’t know what’s come over you. We’ve found Ruth. I should have thought you’d be smiling.’
‘What did the doctor and nurse tell you?’ Melanie asked.
‘Not for you
r ears.’
‘I’m her sister—’
‘It isn’t for you to know.’
In the lift Melanie sniffed and gasped out, ‘She’s going to die, isn’t she?’
‘Yes, that’s right, Melanie,’ her mother said, though with a little humour. ‘She’s going to die, just like we all are. But not now. She’s getting better. I think we’ll go to the Tower of London. It’s not too far.’ But as they made their way there, and walked round inside the great walls of the Tower Jenny Pickering seemed distracted and anxious. Her eyes studied the two ravens on a lawn without really seeing them.
‘Can I come and see Ruth with you tonight?’ Melanie asked, as they ate hamburgers in a McDonald’s before going back to Rutherford Street.
‘No,’ her mother told her. ‘Ruth and me have got to have a private word.’ Melanie shrank. There was something very bad going on concerning her sister and she was scared.
Next morning Jenny went straight to Vanessa’s house, after her third visit to Ruth. Vanessa had rung Geoff Doyle’s office, pretending to be St Thomas’s Hospital, and obtained David Pickering’s address and phone number. This she gave to Jenny, and it was to Vanessa in Vanessa’s kitchen that Jenny unburdened herself.
‘They’re not telling it all,’ she said. ‘But Ruth’s got to have treatment from a therapist on account of what she’s been through. They’re saying she was picked up in a squat, very ill, and brought in by ambulance. She’d not been there long and before that she was somewhere else.’ Jenny Pickering paused. ‘Where that was, I don’t know. I’ve asked her to tell me, but when I do she gets a strange look on her face and won’t speak. I daren’t press her. The nurses won’t tell me. They say she said a lot when she was in a fever, but now she’s clammed up. They say it would be wrong to insist – well, I can tell that for myself – but, oh Vanessa, I’m that worried. What can have been happening to her? It’s been over eighteen months she’s been away from home—’
‘If she’s been living rough,’ suggested Vanessa, ‘well, I don’t know …’
‘I know what it must mean,’ Jenny said bravely. Her round face looked old for a woman in her thirties. ‘How does a young girl live when she’s got no job, no money and no home? Men, of course. It has to be. And she’s had a good haircut, I can see that.’ She shook her head. ‘I told them at the hospital – she may have been living rough for a bit, but it’s not been long. That life leaves a mark on you and, ill as she is, the signs aren’t there. Do you know what I mean? I asked them if she’d been on drugs. They couldn’t say definitely, but they didn’t think so. Where’s she been? What’s been happening to her?’
‘You might have to be prepared not to know – ever,’ Vanessa told her.
‘I know,’ said Jenny. ‘I can bear that, if I have to. But you see, she’s not right. She’s nowhere near the Ruth I used to know. She’s different. She’s very quiet. She’s like somebody who’s had a terrible shock. It’s not just the illness.’ There was a silence. She said, slowly, ‘The hospital wants to see my husband.’
Vanessa said, a little too quickly, ‘Of course I don’t know, Mrs Pickering. But for the time being, I’d just say I couldn’t find him. Mrs Pickering,’ she appealed, excusing herself for having made the implicit criticism, ‘we know what he’s like.’
Jenny Pickering sighed and shook her head sadly. Her face looked even more drawn. ‘He was a different man when he had a steady job,’ she said.
Vanessa didn’t argue. ‘It’s no good for a man, not having a proper job,’ she replied. She changed the subject, saying, ‘To think Melanie was on the verge of coming back home and now you’re down here instead. Did she tell you about Madame Katarina?’
‘I wanted to ask you,’ said Jenny, sitting there, tired, in a blue and white cotton suit. ‘Do you think she might give me a consultation? How much does she charge?’
Vanessa regarded Jenny Pickering, ten years older than herself and so troubled, and replied carefully, ‘She might be able to. But she has lots of appointments.’ She thought to herself that she had an inkling, as did Jenny, of the kind of thing that must have happened to Ruth. She knew how hard it would be for the girl to get over the experiences she must have had. If she ever could get over them. She wondered if Madame Katarina would agree to tell Jenny’s fortune. It seemed to her that the Pickerings might have no luck at all.
Annie was handing out white cardboard boxes stamped ‘George’s Café’ to two boys and a girl, recruited from Melanie’s class at school to do deliveries. ‘Go straight there. I’ve heard you’re often late. Don’t get chatting. These people want fresh food on time. It’s all organised – you’re the weak link in the chain—’ She broke off, and shouted, ‘Arlette!’ Arlette Jones, in a pink dress, advanced towards her. Between relief and anger Annie exclaimed, ‘Thank God – we’ve been searching all over the place for you—’ The delivery team crept off, glad to miss the rest of the lecture, and it was Arlette’s turn to be alarmed.
‘What’s happened?’ she said sharply. ‘Are the twins all right?’
‘Yes,’ Annie told her. ‘They’re in the country with their grandmother. She wants them to stay. But they’re hunting for Sim. Where is he?’
‘Don’t worry about Sim,’ Arlette said forcefully. ‘I knew it’d be all like this as soon as the posh side of his family got hold of the twins. It’d be all for them and nothing to do with us. My mother wants the twins back now and so do I. So if there’s going to be any trouble …’
Annie went to the microwave and got out two pies. She put them on a plate and took them over to a customer. Over her shoulder she asked, ‘Do you mean you’re afraid you won’t get them back?’
‘We’ll get them back,’ Arlette told her. ‘Depends how difficult it’s going to be. So they went to the grandmother?’
‘It seemed the best idea. She’s very attached to them.’
‘They belong to us. They’re meant to be with us. That’s why Sim and Josie left them with us. I only brought them to you so we could have a break.’
‘But, Arlette, where are Sim and Josie? Sim’s father died three weeks ago. The family’s been trying to get hold of him—’
They’ve been trying for years,’ Arlette said. ‘He doesn’t want to be found.’
This was news to Annie. ‘Why not?’ she asked.
Arlette shrugged. ‘That’s his business,’ she said. ‘I only want the children back.’
‘If they found Sim he could tell the family that he and their mother want them to stay with you. But where the hell is he, Arlette?’
‘If I knew,’ she said angrily, ‘I’d go after him myself. I love those kids, but we’ve had them too long. They were babies when we got them, now they’re all over the place.’
‘I know that,’ Annie said with feeling. ‘But, Arlette – they’re desperate. He’s inherited a lot of money and land and no one knows what to do. Give them a ring and they’ll invite you down—’
‘No way I’m going to some heritage home like a beggar!’
‘All they want is some clue about where Sim is.’
‘Colombia – they were going there.’
‘What for?’
‘It wasn’t for a holiday,’ Arlette said. ‘There’s a war there, poor people and I don’t know what.’ She added, ‘He’ll give it away, the lot.’
‘What? His inheritance?’
Arlette nodded and thought better of saying more. ‘Give me the number of that stately home. I’ll phone for the kids. If I get any nonsense I’ll go round my brother’s. He works for a solicitor.’
Arlette vanished into the crowd and Annie phoned Durham House.
‘Arlette’s back,’ she announced to Jasmine. ‘She’s phoning Lady Mary.’
‘Oh, thank God,’ breathed Jasmine. ‘That must mean they can find Sim soon. It’s getting awful – they took a blood test from the twins this morning. And Nigel and Lady Mary. They’re going to try to match up the cells to prove the children are Sim’s. The atmosphere’s horri
ble here. Julian’s coming down to discuss the final plans about the Savernake project, nudged in, probably at that awful Tamsin’s instigation. Now I’m putting them up – sorry, Annie. Can I come up and stay with you? I really can’t stand it any longer. And there’s someone I have to talk to.’
‘Oh, Jas,’ Annie groaned. ‘What are you up to?’
‘No business of thine,’ asserted Jasmine.
‘There’s no room. All the Pickerings are staying.’
‘Pickerings? Oh – Melanie’s family. Any room at Vanessa’s? Would she?’
‘Jas, what’s wrong with your little house in Kensington?’
‘I don’t want to be alone. Nigel’s gone crackers, and there’s something else, as you suspect—’
‘Well, I expect Vanessa can squeeze you in. Bring some food with you. She’s not a millionaire.’
‘Annie,’ came Jasmine’s annoyed voice, ‘I’m aware of that. I’m perfectly willing to help in any way I can.’
‘Sorry. You’ve lived in luxury a long time—’ Annie heard Nigel saying something in an angry voice.
‘Got to go,’ said Jasmine quickly. ‘So the twins’ aunt is phoning?’
At this, Nigel’s voice rose. Annie put the phone down, very gently. She thought sadly of the little twins, unwittingly now part of a dynasty and subject to all the vagaries and dangers of the position. She wondered where Sim was, why he’d gone to Colombia, why Arlette thought he was going to give his inheritance away if he got it. Also, she knew there was something Arlette wasn’t saying.
Next door at the Arcadia, Jenny Pickering helped Vanessa with the preparations for dinner. Melanie, with Jackie, had taken the boys to a film so it was not until she returned to Annie’s house to wait for the boys and get ready to visit Ruth that Mrs Pickering got the call from a sister at St Thomas’s. The nurse’s voice was deliberately calm. She told Jenny that she’d been trying to contact her all afternoon. Ruth had insisted on having the telephone brought to her bedside that morning. Later, a police inspector had arrived asking to talk to a Miss Pickering. The hospital had refused to allow him to speak to her until one of her parents had been consulted but even now a constable was sitting outside the ward, by the lift, waiting. Jenny Pickering asked the sister what she thought was happening.
In Search of Love, Money & Revenge Page 32