11 The Teashop on the Corner (22 page)

‘That was just what I needed,’ he said, giving the young lad a two-pound coin extra, who held it in his hand as if he was scared it would blow up if he put it down.

‘Your tip, you earned it,’ said Leni. ‘So you keep it.’

‘Mint,’ he said, delighted.

‘New starter,’ Leni explained with a grin. ‘He’s done brilliantly.’

‘No cock-ups on my order, it was great,’ said Will. ‘Beautiful little place this. If the other shops he’s building are as nice as this one, you should have a good
footfall of customers coming your way, touch wood.’

‘Thank you,’ said Leni. ‘I hope so. Feel free to call again and give me your custom.’

‘I will,’ he said and stuck his thumb up at the boy.

Will stopped to look in the cabinets as he walked out. There was a notepad with the cover of
Five Little Pigs
. He had once snatched that book from his sister’s hands and flicked
to the back, teasing her that he was going to tell her who the murderer was. She had thrown her hairbrush at him and it had cut his eye open. He’d had to go to hospital, where he’d had
two stitches, and his mother had made his sister go as well. Jackie had cried for the whole two hours that they had sat in Casualty and swore they’d never fight again, and they never had.
God, he wished she were here fighting with him now, living her life, loving a man and children. Nicole had staved off some of his loneliness, being a point of reference in his life, a significant
other to concentrate on and stuff up the gaping hole of sadness which the absence of his family had left him with. More and more he was thinking that was her main function for him, as his had been
banker for her. He sniffed back the rising emotion inside him and crossed the square to talk to Shaun.

‘I must say I like your friends, Molly,’ said Harvey, picking up the post from behind the door as they entered Willowfell. ‘Wasn’t Pavitar Singh a
fascinating chap? I bet he was a doctor or a solicitor or something very highbrow in his heyday. Something about the way he carries himself.’

‘Possibly,’ said Molly, taking off her jacket and hanging it up on the hook behind the door. She had to confess that she was curious about Pavitar Singh too. He was always so
beautifully dressed and was a very handsome man. She wouldn’t have been surprised to discover he was an old Bollywood star.

‘We must go back there again. I enjoyed it so much. All that book passion. My blood was flowing.’

‘I noticed. Would you like a cup of tea?’

‘I would indeed, please.’

Harvey followed Molly into the kitchen.

‘And what a beautiful young lady Carmen was.’

‘Carla.’

‘Yes, sorry, Carla. Although Carmen suits her more, I think. Very Spanish looking.’

‘Italian actually,’ said Molly, pulling two cups out of the cupboard. ‘Lovely girl. Such a sad story.’

She said it without thinking. Harvey picked up on it straightaway.

‘Sad? In what way?’

‘Oh, nothing,’ said Molly, but Harvey wouldn’t let it drop.

‘I shall take anything you tell me to the grave,’ he promised.

‘I wish you’d stop saying things like that,’ snapped Molly.

Harvey chuckled. ‘Believe me, my dear, laughter sometimes really is the best medicine. Now tell me.’

Molly sighed, hoping she wasn’t being disloyal to her new young friend by relaying her business.

‘Carla found out that the man she was married to never divorced his first wife and was planning to go back to her. She discovered all this at his funeral last month. Isn’t that
awful?’

Harvey blew out two slow lungfuls of air and shook his head slowly from side to side.

‘And you thought I was a cad,’ he said.

‘You are,’ said Molly, putting a plate of assorted biscuits on the table.

Harvey reached immediately for a chocolate finger.

‘That is sad. I hope she finds a nice young man soon to heal her heartbreak.’

He chomped on the biscuit for a moment then asked, ‘Did you, Molly? Did you find someone after me?’

Molly put the teapot down on the table with an unintentional slam.

‘No,’ she said stiffly.
No one could ever make me feel like you did.

‘Not even a dinner date?’

‘I had a meal with a local reverend one time,’ admitted Molly. ‘It wasn’t a success.’

‘I could see you as a vicar’s wife.’ Harvey winked at her. ‘What went wrong?’

He wasn’t you.

‘He was ten years older than me physically and twenty mentally. We hadn’t even got to dessert and he was planning the wedding.’ Molly shuddered. Even now, fifteen years later,
she could envisage that date in all its horrid clarity. The Reverend Clarence Cartwright had been persistent to the point of bullying in his efforts to fix up a second date with her. Once again
she’d had to turn to Bernard Brandywine for help in getting him to stop pestering her. ‘He was borderline stalking me.’

Harvey guffawed with laughter, slamming his hand down on the table.

‘You’re very giddy today,’ noted Molly, trying to appear serious. Harvey’s laugh was always so very infectious.

‘I feel on top of the world for that debate in the teashop.’

Molly poured out the tea. ‘It’s a lovely little place. There are some quite delightful things in those cabinets.’

‘I remember you always used to write letters on scented notepaper,’ said Harvey.

‘No one writes letters any more,’ sighed Molly. ‘It’s all emails and texts. I do feel for the young ones, never knowing the thrill of waiting for a letter to arrive from
a loved one.’

‘I bet you’d buy all the contents of that shop if you could.’

‘I would. Though I’d probably misplace them and they’d end up in an antiques shop in Holmfirth,’ Molly said without thinking.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Oh, nothing,’ replied Molly. ‘My memory isn’t what it used to be. I keep losing things.’

‘Of value?’ Harvey’s eyebrows were raised.

What a strange question to ask, thought Molly. She gave him a small nod by way of an answer.

‘Have you told Graham about me yet?’ said Harvey then.

Molly wondered why he had leapt to the subject of her son from talk of the missing items. She hoped he wasn’t insinuating anything by that. He didn’t exactly have room to talk if he
was.

‘He’s in Greece at the moment on holiday. He and his wife have a villa.’

Harvey was so surprised, the passage of the second chocolate finger to his mouth was temporarily interrupted. ‘He has a wife?’

‘Yes. Sherry. And they have a son at university.’

‘Well, bugger me,’ said Harvey, letting out a surprised whistle of breath. ‘Is that them there?’ He pointed to a photo on top of her display cabinet. It was a family
portrait of the Beardsalls which Sherry had given her as a Mother’s Day present a couple of years ago. He pulled himself out of the chair to take a closer look. ‘Dear God, he
hasn’t aged well, has he? Is that shredded wheat on his head? Mind you, he’ll be in his mid to late forties now, won’t he?’

‘If you aren’t going to say anything nice . . .’ Molly made a move to take it from him, but Harvey snatched his arm away.

‘No, let me see. I promise, I’ll play nice.’ He studied the picture and Molly could almost hear the inner workings of his brain trying to form something positive to say.
‘Well, there’s a woman who likes her pies,’ was what he came up with.

‘She’s been good for him,’ said Molly, turning away before he saw the giggle escape. ‘They’re happy together.’

‘And the young man. So like both his parents in looks. Poor sod.’

Molly took the photo from his hand and put it back in its place. ‘That’s enough,’ she said.

‘I’m sorry, Molly,’ said Harvey. ‘There was never any love lost between your son and me, but that was a long time ago. Does he look after you? That’s the main
thing.’

‘Yes, yes, he’s very good,’ Molly lied. Well, he wasn’t bad to her anyway. She would have liked to have seen more of him and less of Sherry. There was something about the
woman she could never trust. She always felt as if Sherry had a hidden agenda every time their paths crossed.

‘Well, that’s all that matters,’ Harvey said on a long drawn-out yawn.

‘You’ve done too much. Finish that tea off and go and have a nap.’

‘I will obey,’ he said, lifting the cup to his lips. ‘One more biscuit.’

Molly slapped his hand as it snaked towards the plate.

‘No. I’m not going to be responsible for you going to an earlier grave than you should.’

‘Molly, I do not want to extend my life by two hours by substituting the food I love for boiled cabbage. I shall die a bon viveur, as I have lived.’

Molly humphed and her arm shot out to lift the plate of biscuits out of his reach. Harvey gripped it en route and looked into her eyes.

‘You, my dear Molly, have made my heart feel stronger today than it has done for a long time.’

Molly tried not to let the sadness show as he quietly finished his tea and then crossed the room and made a slow walk up the stairs to the bedroom with the pale green curtains.

Shaun McCarthy arrived at Leni’s house at six-thirty on the dot.

‘Come in, come in,’ she said in her usual bright and breezy way. ‘I’ve just put the kettle on. Can I get you a coffee?’

‘Please,’ said Shaun. He walked into Leni’s ridiculously cosy cottage to find that her portly ginger cat was sitting on the arm of the sofa and appeared to be watching Ant and
Dec on the TV. His tail was tapping out a rhythm like a slow hand clap. Shaun didn’t know if that was a good or bad sign. What he did know was that he would have killed to be as at peace as
that cat, no worries in his brain, able to shut out the world and relax.

‘Have you eaten? Would you like me to make you a sandwich, Mr McCarthy? Always plenty of food in my cupboards, as you would probably imagine.’

‘No thanks,’ replied Shaun, just as his stomach made a betraying grumble which could have been heard in Benidorm. He knew Leni must have heard it. Even the cat’s eyes seem to
widen in amusement.

‘He looks happy,’ Shaun nodded towards Mr Bingley.

‘He’s always happy,’ said Leni. ‘He’s never been one for doing much. I’ve had more animated cushions than him. My daughter chose him from an animal shelter
when she was thirteen. It was love at first sight for both of them.’

That was enough cat and kid talk for Shaun. He gestured towards the staircase and Leni encouraged him to go up. This time the two other doors were ajar. Through one, he could see what must be
her room: pale cream wallpaper, an ornate cream wardrobe and matching dressing table and a very bouncy-looking violet quilt on the bed. The curtains were lace, fancy – swooping swags and
tails, very French-chateau inspired. Through the next door he could see a small bathroom, white suite, white tiles but with rolls of pastel towels on white shelves. Shaun’s bathroom at home
was white too, cold and clinical without a hint of cosiness about it. How had she managed to make a white bathroom so damned inviting?

He set to work straightaway. Leni brought him a coffee upstairs and a huge plate of biscuits which she put on the table just inside Anne’s room, silently, without disturbing him.

Shaun tried not to be greedy even though he could have swept up all the biscuits and eaten the lot. He hadn’t had time to stop for lunch today. He was behind schedule because one of his
labourers had rung in sick – measles, of all things. Thank goodness Will Linton had been able to step in. He felt so sorry for the guy that he almost didn’t ring, not wanting to
humiliate a former company head by offering him such a menial position. But, as Will said, bills were bills and had to be paid. Shaun needed to get Spring Hill Square finished and start reaping in
the rents before he commenced on another project. He always said that the development he was working on would be his last and it never was. Shaun McCarthy could no more have relaxed than he could
have joined the Royal Ballet as their principal dancer.

Leni brought him up a second coffee after twenty minutes and a plate of freshly made sandwiches. ‘Leave them if you don’t want them, I won’t be offended, but your stomach
sounded rather growly,’ she said, her eyes twinkling with mischief, and turned straight back downstairs.

Shaun didn’t leave any. They hit the spot and stopped his stomach yowling like a kicked wolf. He expected her to make some comment when he took the empty plates and cups down after he had
finished the job, but she didn’t.

‘How much do I owe you?’ she said, reaching for her handbag.

‘A tenner will be fine, for the hinges.’ Anyone else and he would have asked for more, but she’d made him all that food. He had to charge her something though, in case she saw
a free job as a precedent. He didn’t know her well enough to judge if she was the ‘take-the-advantage’ type. Taking the advantage reminded him of something he meant to mention to
her.

‘It must be more . . .’ she remonstrated.

‘No it isn’t, really. But will you take a piece of advice and get rid of that Saturday boy? You don’t know the O’Gowan family like I do. The oldest brother is a headcase.
He’s locked away for murder and you really don’t want to know the details. Another two brothers are in and out of prison for drug-dealing and assault. There’s a sister who had
three children by her eighteenth birthday, all taken into care. As for his father . . .’ Shaun shook his head. ‘. . . Bull O’Gowan: not a nice man. You don’t want to have
anything to do with him or anyone who has anything to do with him. That would be my advice.’

‘And what about Mrs O’Gowan?’ Leni asked, without reacting.

‘Mrs O’Gowan left all her children for another man years ago. Bull always has a woman hanging around him though, but none of them seem to last very long. He likes them young.
Eighteen and they’re thrown out on the scrap heap for being too old and past it. Doesn’t bode well for a stable upbringing, does it?’

‘Well,’ said Leni, sticking out her chin, ‘that’s even more reason for not letting young Ryan go. He said that he’s different to his family.’

‘He would, wouldn’t he?’ laughed Shaun. ‘How can he be different when none of the others are? Too much bad blood. They’re all con men, nutters and
thieves.’