Alys, Always (17 page)

When she hangs up, I say, ‘Are you feeling OK?’

‘Fine, thanks,’ she says. She goes to the sink and fills a glass with water and drinks it down.

‘Let me make you a sandwich for the train,’ I say. ‘You hardly ate anything at supper. You’re going to feel awful in the morning.’

‘Oh, don’t bother,’ she says, but I’ve got nothing better to do, so I quickly cut some bread and wrap it, with some ham and cornichons, in clingfilm. And I cut her a little triangle of apple tart, too, just in case; though (as Teddy said, all those days ago) she never really eats anything, even at the best of times.

‘Aren’t you going to say goodbye to everyone?’ I ask, as the lights of the taxi briefly flood the kitchen window and then sweep on, over the outhouses, the wall of hollyhocks.

‘I don’t think so,’ she says. ‘I think I’ve overstayed my welcome. Just say something came up. An emergency.’ Then she shoulders her bag and goes out into the hall, her shoes sounding assertively on the parquet, and a minute later there’s the noise of the taxi moving off, scattering gravel.

The house is very still for a moment, and then suddenly there’s a burst of wind, startlingly cold through the wide-open kitchen window, and after that I hear it: the rush and rattle of rain. Charlotte and Selma and Teddy and Polly come hurrying in from the garden, incredulous, already soaked; and there’s laughter, as if the weather has given them something else to think about, and they’re all rather relieved.

I tell them what she told me to say – ‘Honor got a call and left in a hurry, she said it was an emergency’ – but to Polly I say, in an undertone, ‘I think she was embarrassed, I think that’s why she went.’

Polly says, ‘Honor doesn’t do embarrassment, haven’t you
noticed?’ She assumes the break-up with Teddy is the whole story: that Honor just took off because after that little scene at supper there was no reason to stay. I don’t say anything to correct that impression.

Laurence comes down in a dry shirt and says, ‘I thought I heard a car,’ when told the news, and then there’s a halfhearted attempt to extend the evening over apple tart and coffee in the kitchen, but it all feels very flat, even though Teddy strives to crack some jokes, just to prove how fine he is.

The rain is ferocious, squally, beating against the house like something trying to get in.

When I go up to my room, I see that I’ve left both windows wide open. The sills are soaked, sopping wet, and water has sprayed over the carpet and a corner of the bed. I shut one window and then I stand at the other one, feeling the roar of the weather, taking deep breaths of the mineral-scented air, staring out at the glittering darkness. Then I close that window and mop things up as best I can.

Later, the dream comes at me with force. I am hurrying over an endless stretch of hot sand, horribly exposed, too frightened to look over my shoulder at the thing that is chasing me, and I’m faltering, stumbling and tripping, my feet forever losing purchase; all my efforts counting for nothing.

The storm moves off some time in the night. As usual I’m the first person downstairs in the morning and when I step outside to drag the sodden stone-heavy damask off the table, the sky is a bright sharp blue and the air has a freshness to it, a suggestion of the year on the turn.

I wring most of the water from the cloth and have just put it in the washing machine when Laurence appears in the
kitchen, saying he intends to spend the morning in his study. We have a brief conversation. I tell him I’m planning to leave before lunch, and he says, ‘Well, see you again soon, I hope,’ and then he goes off carrying a cup of coffee and an apple, a piece of buttered toast clamped between his teeth. I can’t help feeling a little flat as I hear the study door closing behind him.

Selma and Charlotte are the next to appear. They’re on their way to the swimming pool – ‘A last dip before we leave for Bunny’s’ – and they wonder whether I want to join them.

When Teddy comes down a little later, he’s glassy-eyed, as if he too has slept badly. He sits in front of his cornflakes, moving the spoon in the bowl and hardly eating anything.

‘Are you OK?’ I ask, but he just makes a vague noise and turns a page of the newspaper.

I’ve tidied up the kitchen, and I’m about to go upstairs to pack my bag when Teddy pushes his bowl away and says, ‘Oh, and Frances. I’ve been meaning to ask you something.’

I wait with my hand on the door handle. I have no sense of what is coming next.

‘I know you lied to us about the accident,’ he says. ‘I know what you told us wasn’t exactly the truth.’

I stare at him, looking blank, confused, but of course I know precisely what he means. Blood starts to sound in my ears.

‘I’m sorry?’ I say, and because I suddenly feel unsteady I sit down opposite him at the table, though really my instincts are telling me to get out of there and as quickly as possible.

‘I know you lied,’ he says again. ‘I saw your statement, the statement you gave to the police at the scene. I asked Kate Wiggins if I could see the police report and she made it available to me.’ He sits there, leaning back in his chair, arms folded, regarding me with those cool, pale Kyte eyes – Alys’s eyes. It all makes perfect sense: humiliated by last night’s
events, Teddy has chosen this moment to show his hand. His vulnerability has made him vicious. He doesn’t want to be the only one suffering.

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ I say. ‘I didn’t lie.’

‘Oh no? You didn’t invent my mother’s last words? That little killer detail at the end? “Tell them I love them”? Because as far as I can tell, you first came up with that when we met you. There’s no record of it before that point. And I understand you’d been through events with two individual police officers before then.’

I lower my gaze. I can’t meet his eyes. I don’t want him to look me in the face. I don’t want him to see how angry I am.

Of course, most of the anger is directed at myself. I hate that I gave into temptation all those months ago. I hate that I took the risk, even though at the time it was what I needed to say in order to forge a connection with Polly and with Laurence. And I hate that he has this to throw at me when he is at his most wretched.

‘What I don’t understand,’ he’s saying, very slowly, carefully emphasising every word, ‘is why you felt you had to do it. Why would you lie about something like that, to perfect strangers?’

The ambient hum of the washing machine in the utility room next door changes pitch as it progresses through the cycle. The herb garden is bathed in sunshine. A blackbird flies down on to the sundial, and flies off again.

‘It was a stupid thing to say,’ I say eventually. ‘I’m not sure if I can really explain it. It’s unforgivable, of course.’

He waits.

‘Was it so harmful?’ I say in a sudden rush, raising my head. ‘Was it so wrong to want to give you all a little scrap of comfort?’

He hasn’t moved, but there’s a subtle change in his
expression.
He’s not unreachable
, I think.
He wants to trust me. He wants me to make this OK
. The insight gives me courage. ‘Yes,’ I say, ‘it was completely wrong of me. But, oh, Teddy – when I came to the house and met you all … well, I can’t quite explain it. I felt it was what you were waiting for. I wanted to help, even in some tiny, insignificant way. I got carried away, I suppose. I am so very sorry if I’ve caused you more unhappiness.’

We sit there in silence for a moment.

‘Please believe me,’ I say.

He pulls his hands through his hair, and sighs. ‘I do,’ he says. The relief spills through me. I feel quite giddy with it.

‘Do you want me to tell Polly?’ I ask. ‘Does she know? Have you talked about it with anyone else?’

He puts his head back and looks at the ceiling, considering. ‘No, I haven’t mentioned it to her, or anyone,’ he says. ‘I’m not sure what to do. What do you think? Should I tell her? Should you?’ Then he gets up and carries his bowl over to the sink and stands there, gazing out over the gravel drive to the croquet lawn and the field beyond, drumming his fingers lightly on the kitchen counter.

‘Look, let’s keep it between ourselves,’ he says finally. ‘No point in causing anyone more distress. I don’t think Polly would handle it very well. Dad neither. You did it for the best of reasons, I accept that.’

‘Oh, Teddy,’ I say. ‘Thank you for being so good about it. I feel like a total idiot.’

He comes over to me and gives me a hug. ‘You
are
an idiot,’ he says, half-laughing, and when he puts his arms around me I sense the relief in him, too: a sense that he is off the hook somehow, and is grateful to me for that.

I leave Nevers later that morning. Selma and Charlotte have already departed, and both women’s farewells to me were warm, considerably more than cordial. Selma is in the bag, and Charlotte is nearly there. Somehow I think Charlotte is not going to be a problem.

Laurence does not appear to see me off. His study door stays firmly shut. ‘Give my best to your father,’ I remark to Polly and Teddy as we say our goodbyes outside the house. ‘Tell him how much I enjoyed being here.’

As my car passes through the olive-green gate I raise my fingers in a final acknowledgement, but I see in the rear-view mirror that Teddy’s and Polly’s hands are falling to their sides and they’re turning away, walking off towards the archway leading to the back lawn. I know they are already thinking about something else: a game of tennis, perhaps, or whether they can be bothered to walk to the village for a pub lunch.

I carry on driving down the rough track leading along the side of the meadow, and then I turn on to the road that heads through Biddenbrooke. A few listless children hang around the climbing frame on the green. There’s a chalked board outside the King’s Arms, drumming up interest for a hog roast.

My parents are expecting me for lunch. The roads are quiet, so I make good time. On the outskirts of my parents’ village, just past my old primary school, I stop at a red light. While I’m waiting I reach over into the passenger seat to unzip my bag. There it is, tucked in at the side: the grey shawl that belonged to Alys, the one that used to hang on a peg in the hall. It’s such a pretty colour, and it’s so soft: cashmere, of course. I hold it to my face, and I think I just catch a faint memory of her scent caught up in its fibres: the fresh, lively scent that made me think of morning.

I wrap it around my shoulders as the lights change, and then I drive on.

My parents have set up a picnic table in the garden. ‘Isn’t this
glorious?
’ my mother says, unpopping foldable chairs and disregarding the rather stiff breeze that is sending the paper napkins fluttering like giant yellow butterflies into the euphorbias. I imagine this al fresco lunch was sketched out in some detail a few days ago, and the improvisation needed to revise and relocate it proved too daunting. So here we sit, a little cold, under a jaunty striped parasol that lifts and strains in its moorings, offering each other coleslaw and cherry tomatoes and slices of baguette and triangles of quiche Lorraine.

‘Just some people I know,’ I say, when they ask about the friends I’ve been visiting in Biddenbrooke. ‘It turned into a bit of a house party. We went to the beach a few times, but mostly we just stayed at the house. There was a pool,’ I add, despising myself for the boast.

‘Lovely!’ says my mother, who cannot swim.

Of course, they know Biddenbrooke quite well. I probably remember the Howards, don’t I? Brian and Maggie? Their son Mark? He’s on the radio a fair bit nowadays, something to do with the Office of Fair Trading. Only last week he turned up on one of those consumer programmes, talking about extended warranties.

I sit there, holding my face perfectly still, waiting for her to get to the point.

‘Mill House,’ my father says gently, spooning out Branston pickle. ‘Biddenbrooke.’

That’s right. Mill House. Biddenbrooke. Oh, it’s such a shame about all that, my mother says, adopting a sorrowful expression. I can see her sails filling with a sort of gloomy
superstitious triumph, as if other people’s misfortune means there’s likely to be less of it in general circulation. Less for her.

The Howards bought Mill House – when was it, Robert? Five, six years ago? Such a pretty spot. Anyway, they’ve just put it on the market. It’s too much for them now. Gas bills are getting to be a real worry. Maggie says in winter the hot air just flows out through those old sash windows like a river. And though Brian has almost completely recovered from his stroke, the stairs weren’t getting any easier. They’re looking at something much smaller. Easier to manage. There’s a new development outside Fulbury Norton which they’re considering. It sounds rather swish, she concludes, and with that word all sorts of reservations are economically conveyed.

Handy for the golf club, my father says, wistfully.

‘Brie or Boursin, dear?’ she asks, passing me the cheese plate with its fussy little knife, the knife that forks at the end like a serpent’s tongue.

Mary is away from her desk – I can see her from here, she has been in Robin McAllfree’s fish tank for the last forty-five minutes – but her extension is ringing. It’s an internal call, so I pick up. ‘Mary’s phone,’ I say.

It’s Colin from the front desk. There’s someone here to see Mary, he says. ‘Lady called Julia Price? She has an appointment.’

I thank Colin and ask him to send her up.

God knows where Oliver has got to.

I stand by the elevators, checking myself in the stainless steel doors. I still have my healthy summer colour, and my new haircut suits me: it’s shorter, more definite-looking. I lean forward to inspect my eyes, my teeth.

The doors open and Julia Price is standing there, with a security pass clipped to her lapel.

‘Julia, hello,’ I say as she steps out. ‘I’m afraid Mary’s a bit tied up at the moment. She won’t be a moment. I’m Frances.’ We shake hands. Her palm is cool and dry. She’s wearing a blue and white seersucker jacket and espadrilles which tie with a ribbon at the ankle. A thin cotton scarf is knotted over the strap of her bag, just in case she wants to pull it around her throat later. The white flash in her hair shows up the absolute freshness of her face. It’s the perfect foil for her sort of attractiveness.