A Little Love (15 page)

‘Do you know, you are quite an incredible woman, Pru.’

‘No, I’m not.’ She felt the creep of a blush over her neck.

‘Yes, yes you are. I don’t know many people that would open their hearts and their homes to a stranger in need, especially at a time like this. You are amazing and I am very lucky to know you.’

Pru coughed away the shout of happiness that bubbled in her throat and stared out of the window.
‘I am very lucky to know you!’
His words were encouraging and felt very much like a step forward, an endorsement, and this thought filled her with a burst of excitement.

Eventually Christopher pulled the car off the motorway and into the narrow, winding lanes that took them deep into the Devon countryside. The thick wide hedgerows holding dog rose and rowan bounded undulating fields that spread like a rippling patchwork. The sky was big, uncluttered and the palest blue. It was beautiful. Pru sat up straight and held her breath, wondering how they would manage if they met a car of similar width coming in the opposite direction.

Christopher saw her flinch and laughed. ‘Look at you, you are such a townie! You can relax. As long as everyone goes slowly enough and we all breathe in, there is always enough room to pass!’

‘I can’t help it, I’m London born and bred. I’ve got the Thames running through my veins and I feel a bit queasy if I go near fields and cows. All this fresh air hurts my lungs.’

At last the hedgerows became shallower and Pru could make out a dip in the hills and water glinting beyond.

‘Welcome to Salcombe.’ Christopher hummed as he drove down towards the harbour and pulled into the car park. It was mid morning; the salty breeze that blew in from the estuary tempered the sun. The main street twisted away from them with cobbles at its centre and terraces of pretty shops and coffee houses on each side. It was quaint yet classy, busy without being crowded.

‘This is lovely.’

‘Yes, one of my favourite places. It’s where I come to escape. My friend has a pub here, my favourite pub.’

‘It’s a long way to come for a pint.’

‘Ah, but it’s not just the best pint, they do the best fish and chips as well. And we shall get fudge from Cranch’s to eat on the motorway.’

They sat and watched the boats bobbing around on the choppy water. Rigid-hulled inflatable tenders chugged back and forth to deposit sailors of all ages on to their yachts.

‘It’s peaceful here.’ Pru liked the delicate sounds of the rigging knocking against the masts and the gulls swooping overhead.

‘Yes, I breathe properly here.’ Christopher took a big lungful of air. ‘It feels a world away from Westminster and the hassle of town. The moment I step out of the car, my shoulders un-knot and my worries drift away. I’d like to live here one day – a slow, simple life. I’d buy a little boat and go fishing in the afternoons and then cook my catch for supper. In the winter I’d warm my feet in front of a log fire and drink red wine until I fell asleep.’

‘That sounds nice.’

‘Do you
mean
it sounds nice or are you just being polite?’ He nudged her with his elbow.

‘I’m not being polite. I never think of a world outside of London, but then I come somewhere like this and I can see me pottering, baking and sitting in the sun. I’ve never had a garden and I think I’d really like that.’

‘I think I’d like that too.’

He gripped her hand as they sat on the quayside. Two seagulls squabbled over a long-abandoned chip, just feet away. ‘Now, this is how to spend a day off, don’t you think?’

She nodded, allowing the swell of happiness to sink down to her stomach. It was replaced instantly by guilt. How could she be enjoying life, sitting in a state of bliss when Bobby…

Christopher looked first at her face and then his watch. ‘It’s okay, go ahead, you are due one.’

Pru didn’t want to use up her tear allowance, but she couldn’t seem to help it. It wasn’t so bad when she was busy at Plum’s, but here her grief just seemed to flow out of her, like a tap on a tank full of sadness that she couldn’t switch off. She resolved to try harder to follow Christopher’s new philosophy. She dashed away the tears that slid down her cheeks, and spoke through her distress. ‘I’ve decided to follow your advice. Life will begin when you let it.’

He squeezed her hand in sympathy. ‘Right, a slow walk and then lunchtime, methinks.’ Christopher jumped up and helped her to her feet.

He linked her arm inside his as the two of them ambled along, giving Pru time to compose herself as they strolled along Fore Street towards the Victoria Inn. It looked welcoming: a row of vast hanging baskets hung against the exposed stone of the front and the window boxes were full to bursting with vibrant blooms that spilled over, fighting for space. The brass sign was polished, and the dog bowl full of water was a clear message that all were welcome whether on two legs or four.

‘Christopher!’ The landlady hurried out from behind the bar and threw her arms around his neck.

‘Hello, Liz. Long time no see.’

‘Too long. And who’s this?’ Liz stepped forward to appraise Pru.

‘This is Pru, my friend.’

Liz smiled and nodded, then gave Pru a watered-down version of the same hug. ‘Hello, Pru, his friend.’

It was inviting and warm. Christopher nipped off to the loo, leaving the two women alone. Pru took in the cosy tables, fireplace, freshly painted wood and stunning flowers in vintage pitchers. ‘I love your pub, it’s beautiful, even if it’s a little too far away to be my local.’

‘Rubbish, it’s Christopher’s local and that’s a ten-hour round trip!’

‘He says he’s brought me all this way for your fish and chips.’

‘He’s a darling. It’s lovely to see him looking happy, especially after that terrible business with his nephew. Tragic.’ Liz shook her head.

Pru nodded, unable to give Liz all the facts, not wanting to cry again.

Liz continued. ‘I haven’t seen him for months and he looks different, you’re obviously very good for him. He had a tough few years back there, and now losing the boy… He deserves good things.’

We both do.
Pru nodded. ‘We do get on well, but, you know, it’s early days, we’re just friends really.’

Liz turned in response to a shout from the kitchen. ‘I’m coming!’ She put her hand on Pru’s shoulder. ‘It might be early days, Pru, but I’ve got a feeling you might be just what the doctor ordered. And judging by the colour of your cheeks, I’d say he’s doing the same for you too.’

Christopher approached the table, rubbing his hands together with gusto as he took up a stool opposite her. ‘We are in for a treat.’

Pru looked into her lap.

‘You know, Pru, grief and punishment are two very different things. It’s okay to miss her and to feel sad, but you can’t feel guilty every time you have a happy thought, because life does go on.’

She nodded. He was right.

Christopher looked at his watch. ‘And I’m sorry, but you’re not allowed any more tears for another forty-five minutes. Can you sniff them back up?’

She smiled and sniffed. Yes she could.

With their stomachs full of the best fish and chips Pru had ever tasted, the two of them lay on the sand at East Portlemouth, beached and sleepy. Liz had packed them off with a bottle of wine and two plastic glasses and the ferry had delivered them across the estuary. It was perfect, a chance to collect their thoughts.

‘Liz is nice.’

‘Yes, she is one in a million. And she approved of you, so that’s good.’

‘Is it?’ She propped herself up on her elbow, watching him lying there on the sand with his eyes closed.

‘Yes, for me. I don’t have many friends, so it’s nice to think that those I do have are all going to get on.’

Friends? Is that what we are?

Christopher continued. ‘I’m a fairly open book, Pru. Been involved in politics since university, married young, widowed young, no kids, sadly.’

Pru thought of her own childless state and pictured Bobby. She was so lucky to have had her for the time she did. Pru could still hear her mother’s disdainful little jibes, dished out at every opportunity –
‘Why don’t you get yourself a nice fella, get married and have a baby. It’d do you the world of good’
–
as if she was suggesting a brisk walk or an early night. Pru would pooh-pooh the idea, change the subject, make a joke – anything to stop the sadness rising to the top like cream and rendering her speechless, clogging her throat with regret.

Pru had spent decades longing for a baby, considering every avenue from fostering to adoption, but knowing that once checks had been run, that door would be closed to someone like her. Despite her advanced years, she would still often wake in the grip of a nightmare, screaming out that she could hear her baby crying but couldn’t find it. Milly would rush in, knowing from the years spent sharing a room that the only way to deal with it was to hold her tightly and say, ‘It’s okay, Pru, the baby is safe, sleeping soundly.’ In her dream-like state, Pru would believe her and go back to sleep.

Christopher was pondering. ‘Funnily enough, I don’t think I really mind not having children, but paradoxically I can see that I will mind not having grandchildren.’

As if on cue, a fat-legged toddler waddled over from the dunes with a bucket in one hand and a tiny fist full of sand in the other. Her little pink sun hat flopped down over her eyes as she tottered. Her grandma jogged behind in hot pursuit, her linen trousers rolled up above the ankle. She raised her hand in a wave and rolled her eyes in mock anger, clearly loving every second.

Pru waved back before turning her attention to Christopher. ‘I understand that completely. When you’re our age and have more time, it feels a shame not to have a little one to love. It’s one of the reasons I’m so sad for Bobby. She never got the chance to be a mum, to have part of her carry on, and it’s the same for me.’

Both paused and thought of Bobby and William. Recalling the fact that they were dead was like lancing the bubble the two of them had been in all day. It also threw up the question of Meg. Pru sighed, once again preoccupied by the complexity of the situation. ‘And William not seeing his little baby… I feel sad about him missing out and that makes me feel very disloyal to Bob.’

‘Meg’s child will only know the life it has, Pru. You can’t worry about what it won’t have, because it won’t know any different. Lots of kids don’t have dads, or mums, but as long as they have someone that has their back, they will do just fine.’

‘I know that. I know what it’s like to grow up without. My family was poor, very poor. Not like today, when you might not have the right brand of trainers or you struggle to buy a car. I mean sharing a single mattress on the floor, not enough food, and being a bit grimy – that sort of poor. But as clichéd as it sounds, we were happy.’ Christopher reached over and touched Pru’s arm. She stared up at the sky, followed a seagull gliding on the thermals. ‘My dad died when I was little and my mum battled her whole life just to put a loaf on the table. Milly’s dad, my uncle, got killed in an accident in the docks and so my aunt and her two kids moved in with us and it was chaos! I picture my mum, scraping around for the rent every week, doing anything and everything; selling whatever she could get her hands on, including her wedding ring.’

The day her mother had slipped the thin gold band from its niche on her finger had been a terrible day. She had sobbed with the ring in her hand and her head on the table, then marched up to the pawnshop and handed it over without so much as a blink; chest out, chin up. Pru instinctively twisted the diamond band on her own finger – symbol of all that she had achieved, reminder of the poverty she had risen above. ‘I watched her work her way into an early grave.’

‘Oh, Pru, that must have been so tough.’

‘I suppose it was, but it’s like what you were saying, when you don’t know any different, you just get on with it, don’t you?’

‘I guess you do.’ Christopher blushed a little. ‘And you are right, you really don’t know any different. I had a very expensive education, holidays on the Riviera, a pony! At school, I was being pushed towards the law, lured by the prospect of a huge salary. My parents had a pink fit when I told them I was going to study politics.’

Pru leant back into the sand, watching the clouds drift lazily overhead. It was so easy to open up to Christopher, especially on a day like today with the sun shining and the quiet hum of families enjoying the beach. Not that she could be entirely open. The thought of what she would have to divulge sent a wave of sickness spinning through her stomach. She sat up straight and exhaled.

‘I could have done well at school, I think. I was very keen. But I left at fourteen and started work at the Bryant and May factory – that was horrible, but we needed the money more than I needed an education and so that was that, no debate or discussion. It was a given.’

She closed her eyes briefly, picturing Milly and her, top to toe in their sagging bed, plotting their future far away from Bow and the factory.

‘There was only one thing we knew how to do really well: make fairy cakes, just like our nan had shown us. So we thought, well then, that’s what we’ll do! We were so naive, but strangely that helped us; we didn’t see most of the barriers that should have held us back.’

Their plan was to raise money to fund their tutelage under Monsieur Gilbert. He was the most celebrated patissier in England – they collected articles about his work and his protégés, who regularly found work in the finest kitchens in Europe – and they would not settle for anyone else. To be the best they needed to be taught by the best. It was decided that once they had both mastered the requisite baking skills, Pru would run the baking business and look after the PR and marketing while Milly would concentrate on staff, the accounts and the building. This had proved an unbeatable set-up, with each able to listen to and advise the other whenever necessary. Pru remembered that they weren’t talking at the moment. She couldn’t wait for their disagreement to blow over.

‘My God, Pru, think of what you’ve achieved. You are remarkable.’ Christopher leant forward, eager to hear more.