Death of a Stranger (13 page)

“You live alone,'' Tim said. Anna wondered if his statement was really a question. “Which could make the hospital decide you should convalesce here rather than at home.''

“So I'll still be here when you get back from Scotland. I think I can cope with that, darling. One week.''

“I don't know …''

“Please go. I'll feel much less guilty if you get your marriage trip, and I can think about you in Scotland together. I'm stocked up with paperbacks, and there's the TV and nice doctors and nurses to talk to. Please try first thing in the morning to book for as soon as there are vacancies. Anna!''

“Lorna means it, Tim. So – if you still want to?''

“Of course.''

But Anna was cold because of Tim for the second time since he had become her husband, seeing the hesitation in his eyes. “All right. I'll see in the morning what I can do.''

They drove home in silence, but as they stopped on the short slope up to the garage door Tim put his hand on Anna's. “ I do want to go to Scotland, darling. Be alone with you where no one can get at us. It's just … Part of me feels there's unfinished business here and that I ought to be on the spot to clear it up.''

Infinitely solaced, Anna twisted her hand upwards and laced his fingers. “I understand.'' She was shocked that she had questioned her happiness. “But there really isn't anything you can do about Constance Lorimer. Or about anything Simon Shaw might have tried to do. Awful as the thought is, he'll have a free hand when they're back in England. But you don't really think he tried to hurt her, do you?''

“I don't suppose so. The worst I can think, really, is that if he was the target of the car he hid behind her. Which would make him a wretch of the first order but not a would-be killer. No, I can't do anything here. Let's try and get away.''

She kissed his cheek. “ Let's. Ah. Whitby.''

The large middle-aged tabby cat was vaulting gazelle-like on to the bonnet of the car, and rode on it into the garage when Tim had opened the doors, according to his nightly habit if he happened to be around when the car came home. As usual he changed places with Duffy as the front door was opened, and was sitting upright by the fridge when they entered the kitchen.

Tim's arms were round Anna from behind as she opened it.

“Always remember that I love you!'' he whispered fiercely. “And always will. I'm like my poor father.''

“I don't know who I'm like, but I'll always love you, Tim. Did your father never love anyone else?''

“Only as a son and a father. He was a one-woman man. And perhaps he had the same hope I had: that Mother would eventually come back to him. I think if he'd lived longer she might have done.''

Anna's hesitation was brief. “She said as much to me this afternoon. When I asked her. Did you never ask her?''

“I wanted to, but I was afraid of her answer. Oh, darling, thank you. I wish he'd known.''

“Maybe he did.''

When she had fed Whitby and Duffy Anna started rummaging in the fridge.

“What are you doing?''

“Looking for food. I'm ravenous.''

“Me too. Bacon and eggs and fried bread?''

When they had eaten they went out into the garden hand in hand. The clouds had stayed away, and the sky was high and so star-studded they had to search among them for the crescent moon. Whitby in the monochrome world was mysterious and undomestic, a black shadow using a clematis as a rope ladder and showing off his kinetic silhouette on the wide top of the old brick wall as he gave himself an all-over double-jointed clean. Their laughter as they watched him rang out in the clear silent air.

“We'll always be glad to get home when we go away,'' Anna said, as they walked the narrow boundaries and inspected the metamorphosed bushes in their gradations of starlit black and grey.

“I'm glad you said that. I've been wondering … Haven't you felt that you'd like to move, Anna? Live out of Town in a more convenient house with bigger rooms and more garden?''

“Oh, no, Tim!'' The idea dismayed her. “ I love Rouge Rue and the way you and your belongings fit it. There's plenty of room, the garden's quite big enough, and it's hardly a long way into the country. Oh, lord …''

“What is it?'' Tim straightened up from his contemplation of some ghostly golden rod and resumed her hand.

“That was a completely selfish reaction, wasn't it? Perhaps
you
want to move.''

“Stick-in-the-mud Le Page? Not on my own account, but if you wanted to it would be different.''

“But you'd still feel reluctant?''

“I don't know. I don't think so, if you wanted to go.''

“Oh, Tim.'' It would only ever be his work that made him selfish.

“Thank you, but I truly don't want to move and I can't think of anything that would make me feel differently.''

Tim wondered whether she was opening the way obliquely to the important subject neither of them had ever broached. But even if she wasn't, the time seemed right.

“Come and sit down. It'll be warm enough for a few minutes.'' He drew her across to the tree and their long chairs, not yet dew-damp. “Anna,'' he said when they were settled, “you say you can't think of anything that would make you want to leave Rouge Rue. Does that mean you don't want to have a – another baby, or just that you think you could manage one in this house?''

“Ah.'' She knew, of course, that this moment had had to come, but as she did not know her own mind on the subject she had decided to let Tim introduce it unless she became aware that it was hanging too uncomfortably tacit between them. That point had not been reached, but it could be that she had just issued him with an invitation. “ Tim, I honestly don't know.''

“You haven't ruled out the idea, then? I thought you might have done.''

“No, I haven't,'' she said slowly, still not knowing whether this was because her sense of fair play made her feel she should even the score between them, allow him as well as her to be a parent (although her son was dead she did not feel childless), or because she herself wanted another child. His child. “ Would you like to be a father, Tim?'' What she could see of his face hadn't changed, but a tremor had passed down his long sprawling body. “ I want an honest answer.''

“I'll try to give you one. I always – saw fatherhood as something that would happen if I got married. Saw it as a natural follow-on. Until I met you, Anna. It's a paradox: you're the only woman I've ever known that I've wanted to marry, yet marriage didn't seem an inevitable step for us. Which seemed to mean that being a father didn't for me. And even now, having achieved the one, I don't any more think of the other as having to follow. Being likely to follow, even.''

“Are you saying you'd rather it didn't follow?''

“If it would go against what you want, of course that's what I'm saying.'' Tim pulled himself upright and leaned forward to take her hand. “And I'll be content. But if you feel … If you would like to have another baby, then I'd like it too.''

“Oh, Tim.'' Oh, but she was blessed. He had shown her without knowing it how much he wanted to carry on his line, yet if she refused him he wouldn't sulk or repine, wouldn't take it out on her, let it sour their union. If he didn't let work overtake him sometimes, absorb his attention and blunt his sensitivity, he would probably be too good to be true. “ I'm only thirty-five and I'd like another child.'' She knew what she wanted in the moment of speaking. “ So let's try and have one.''

Tim shouted “Whoopee!'' and pulled her to her feet. Whitby abandoned his toilet and stared at them rigid with surprise, his eyes shining in the starlight and Duffy, who since they left the house had been a mere scuffling in the bushes, pushed his cold wet nose against Tim's leg.

Anna burst out laughing as they hugged one another, pointing from dog to cat. “ You struck a chord with the gang, Tim.''

“Thirty-five,'' he whispered. “And I'm thirty-seven. There's plenty of time. D'you want to wait a bit?''

“No.''

Picking up a cushion apiece from the chairs, and with no more talk, they went slowly back to the house.

They were lucky: in the morning Anna was able to book a flight to Glasgow at four o'clock the next afternoon, and both the car hire company and the hotel where they had planned to begin their Scottish week were able to accommodate them.

“We can ring the other hostelries when we arrive at the first,'' Tim said on the telephone, when she had managed to get hold of him. “Or just drive off and hope for the best. We'll get in somewhere.''

“We will. And it's time I went to work. I'll go and see Lorna before my afternoon visits.''

It was the right sort of corrective to euphoria as well as to anxiety, to carry out successful micro-surgery on a guinea pig and discover that a cat in crisis had turned the corner during the night and was blinking up at her with unclouded eyes as it got to its feet to greet her. By the time Anna found her mother-in-law looking elegant in her armchair she had just about regained her equilibrium, which helped her absorb the sight of Simon lolling on the bed. Before he saw her he was relaxed and smiling, but he got up the moment he was aware of her and nodded gravely.

“Well?'' Lorna demanded. “Have you been on to the airport?''

“Yes. And booked a flight for tomorrow afternoon. And our hire car and first hotel.''

“Oh, that's good. I'm so glad, Anna.''

“Thank you.'' Anna was speaking to Simon as well, who had brought the other chair round beside Lorna. She sat down, and with a nod from Lorna, Simon returned to the bed. “ You'll be going back to London tomorrow, Simon?''

Simon glanced at Lorna, who nodded again. “I've decided to stay till the weekend,'' he said diffidently, “ when hopefully Lorna'll be well enough to leave with me.''

“That's good.'' Anna thought she meant it, although she wondered a bit warily how Tim would react to the news and rejoiced anew that they were going away. “One of the advantages of being self-employed.''

“He should be going tomorrow,'' Lorna said. “And I've tried to make him. But he won't leave me.''

Anna saw again the look she had seen in Lorna's face when they were on L'Ancresse Common and she had spoken about Simon, this time directed openly at its object. And returned, Anna saw, as she looked from one to the other. Obviously she was not considered to be the same inhibitory factor as her husband. Perhaps when they were away she could try to prepare him.

It was another glorious afternoon, and thinking that the dense holiday crowd which would be milling about the Golden Rose would render even his tall fairness unremarkable, Simon decided to risk joining it for a second time, to harden or dissolve his tentative plans for the coming night. He did not burden Lorna with them, but he told her of his decision to make another daytime visit, and she saw him off with wary approval.

When he had wandered for a while round the indoor sales area, covertly observing the Charters at stretch and too busy to fix their eyes on anything beyond till, gift wrapping, and the immediate client, Simon took a cold drink to an outside table from where he could still see them. He even ventured to smile at the boy when his mother sent him outside for a break and he stood kicking at the ginger-coloured pebbles that floored the refreshment area.

“You're a hero!'' he said, following up the smile. “ Why not tell me about the Golden Rose while you take a bit of a rest? It's a super place.''

He saw suspicion cloud the pale young face, and was adjudging it an insurmountable reflex reaction when to his pleased surprise Benjamin Charters suddenly returned his smile and shuffled into the other chair at the small table. Perhaps it was that people just didn't bother.

“Yes, it's really nice here,'' Simon quickly followed up. “ Don't you feel lucky, actually living here and being able to help?''

The smile warmed. “ You bet! It's jolly hard work, though.''

“I can see that. You and your Mum and Dad seem to do it all. You must get awfully tired.''

The boy considered. Now, Simon thought, completely off his guard. “ S'pose we do. Even though we enjoy it. That's why Mum and Dad are hoping to get some help … soon …'' The boy's tumbling words dropped into silence and his eyes widened as the animation left his face and he stared at Simon. Not afraid of
him
, it seemed to Simon. Just afraid.

“Yes?'' Simon encouraged. “You could certainly use some. People obviously love coming here. Are you interested in the roses?''

“I love them!'' The radiance was restored, he had struck lucky.

“You have help with those, I suppose?''

“Gosh, yes. Expert help. I talk to them sometimes and learn how they look after them.''

“You'd like to go into the business when you're older?''

“Yes. I like the roses better than – than the people.''

“You seem to me to do very well with the people.''

The boy shrugged. “ Sometimes … Grown-up people …''

On a pang of pity, Simon wondered if the boy's problems might disappear, or at least lessen, if grown-up people made the effort to draw him out. Emboldened by glances of grim approval being intermittently cast at his table by the boy's parents, he moved the conversation on.

“Is the part of the Golden Rose where you live separate, so that you can get right away when you want to?'' Simon waited warily. The boy had no doubt been warned by his parents that the insurance company might try underhand methods. But to his relief the response was open and eager.