Night Music (32 page)

‘Why aren’t you here yet? You said you’d be with me at three.’ Kitty was lying on a blanket by the edge of the lake, listening to the crickets and staring into the infinite blue above her. Occasionally a bumblebee would hum past her ear, but she didn’t flinch even when one landed on her T-shirt. It was too hot to move. Besides, she was trying to get a sun tan. She had read in a magazine that your legs looked better brown. In London their tiny garden had faced north and never got any sun.

‘My mum’s being really weird,’ Anthony said.

She chewed a blade of grass. ‘They’re all weird. It’s their job.’

‘No. She’s . . . I think there’s something weird going on between our folks.’

Kitty dropped the grass and waited, listening to her mother hammering at skirting-boards downstairs. The noise echoed across the water, splintering the peace of the lake. She thought she had probably preferred it when her mother had played music. ‘Weird in what way?’ she asked.

He sounded uncomfortable. ‘Don’t say anything, okay? But I think my dad’s been overcharging your mum.’

‘Overcharging?’ She squinted at a cloud, pulling at a strand of her hair. ‘He’s a builder, Ant. I thought that came with the territory.’

‘No, I mean by a lot. Serious amounts.’

Anthony lowered his voice. ‘I went into the office this morning and my mum was there, going through all the receipts to do with your house. She looked really odd . . .’

‘Are you and Dad still not talking?’

‘We don’t seem to have much to talk about at the moment,’ she had replied calmly. She glanced at the copy invoices, all of which were made out to Mrs Isabel Delancey.’ She had picked one up. ‘It seems your father and I have very different ideas about the right way to treat people.’

‘What do you mean, Mum?’

She looked up, and it was as if she had only just seen him. ‘Nothing, darling. Just talking to myself.’ She stood up, brushed down her trousers, fixed on that bright smile. ‘Tell you what, I’m going to make some iced tea. Would you like some?’

Anthony’s voice was low and hurried. ‘I think she’s worked out Dad’s been overcharging. She’s quite old-fashioned, my mum. She wouldn’t like that kind of thing. When she went downstairs, I had a look at a couple of the invoices. That hot-water tank – I’m pretty sure he charged your mum twice what it cost him.’

‘Wouldn’t that be the labour cost, though?’ Her mother was always going on about that. ‘I mean, my mum doesn’t seem to think there’s much wrong. She says it’s costing a fortune, but when you look at what he’s done . . .’

‘You don’t understand.’

‘The house is falling apart.’

Anthony was impatient now. ‘Look, Kitty, my dad’s an arsehole. He does what he wants and he doesn’t care. He wanted your house for years, and I reckon that’s why he’s been overcharging your mum. To try to force her out.’

Kitty sat up. She drew her knees to her chin. She felt suddenly cold, despite the balmy air. ‘He wanted our house?’

‘Before you came, yes. Him and Mum. Once you’d moved in I thought they’d got over it. It’s just a house, right?’

‘Right,’ said Kitty, uncertainly.

‘Besides, I don’t usually pay much attention to what my dad does. You learn to keep your head down in this family. But there was that invoice, and Mum, and I don’t think the work he’s doing is right. And I overheard some weird stuff Asad was saying to him the other day.’

‘
Asad?
’

It was as if he guessed he’d said too much. ‘Look – don’t say anything to your mum. Not yet. I reckon mine might get him to pay some of it back, put it right. He owes her at the moment—’ She heard him call a muffled response. ‘I’ve got to go. Listen – do you want to meet me at the pub later on? They’re doing an outdoor barbecue tonight and anyone can go.’ He added, ‘My treat.’

The water was opaque at the edges, a sludgy film leaching on to the shore. ‘Okay,’ she said.

Isabel was kneeling on the floor, daubing the boards in the hallway with pungent pale grey paint. ‘Don’t come too close,’ she said, as Kitty ran up the steps from the kitchen. ‘I haven’t accounted for footprints.’ She sat up and surveyed what she had done. There was a spot of grey paint on her cheekbone, and her white shirt hung limply from her shoulders. ‘What do you think?’ she said.

‘It’s nice,’ Kitty told her.

‘I wouldn’t have painted them, but they were such a horrible mismatch of colours, and so grimy. I thought this would brighten things up a bit.’

‘I’m going out,’ Kitty said. ‘There’s a barbecue at the pub and I’m meeting Anthony.’

‘That’s nice, lovey. Have you seen Thierry?’

‘He was in with the chickens.’ He had been talking to them, telling off the larger ones for bullying, but when he had seen her he had shut up.

‘I’ll be stuck here for a while yet,’ Isabel said. ‘I need this side to dry before I start on the other. Do you think paint dries faster in the heat?’

They heard footsteps on the stairs and Matt appeared, his tool-belt round his waist and his T-shirt sticking to his upper body. He halted at the bottom. ‘I’m done. I thought we might go for a drink if— He started when he saw Kitty, then recovered himself. ‘If either of you ladies fancied it.’

‘No, thanks,’ said Isabel. ‘I have a few things to do. Is the bathroom working now?’

‘I’ve been doing the master bedroom. You should take a look.’

Her mother looked up at him. ‘But I asked you to do the bathroom. We need a bathroom, Matt. We agreed you would focus on that.’

‘I’ll do it tomorrow,’ he said. ‘You should take a look at that bedroom.’ It was as if he’d not heard her. ‘You’ll love it. It’s beautiful. Go on – go and take a look.’

Kitty watched her mother’s jaw tighten. She wanted to say something, but she had told Anthony she wouldn’t. ‘I’m so sick of that tin bath,’ she said instead. ‘Shouldn’t be that hard to plumb in a bathroom.’

Matt didn’t seem to notice. ‘You’d never know that ceiling had come down. In fact, I’d say the cornicing in that room is better than when it was originally built. Go on – I want you to see it.’

Her mother sighed and pushed a sweaty strand of hair off her face. She was obviously struggling to contain her frustration. ‘Matt, could you go past so that I can finish painting this floor? Kitty darling, I want you home before it gets dark.’

‘Okay,’ Kitty said, staring at Matt.

‘Anthony will walk back with you, will he?’

‘Yes.’

‘You going to the barbecue, are you? Do you want a lift to the road?’ said Matt.

‘No.’ She glared at him, then added, under her mother’s pointed stare, ‘Thank you.’

‘Suit yourself,’ he said. ‘You sure I can’t tempt you, Isabel?’

Kitty waited until Matt’s brake-lights had disappeared, then walked briskly through the woods to the road, the shade offering welcome respite from the heat, which even in the early evening hung low and sticky over the valley. She no longer saw imaginary spooks behind trees, or mad axemen in the distance. She knew now the real threat lay far closer to home. She thought of Matt, his jokes and chat, his bags of croissants, the way he had pretended to be their friend. How they had
all
pretended to be their friends. How many people had known what he was doing?

When she came out of the woods, her head was spinning. She had promised to meet Anthony at six, but the light was on in the shop and she could see people inside. At the last minute, Kitty Delancey changed direction.

‘So he says, “How
dare
you?”’ said Henry, trying to keep a straight face. ‘“My name is
Hucker
. Rudolph Hucker.”’ He slapped his hand on the counter and roared with laughter.

‘Don’t make me laugh,’ gasped Asad, who was bagging up change in the till. ‘I’ll wheeze.’

‘I still don’t get it,’ said Mrs Linnet. ‘Tell me again.’

‘Perhaps you should have introduced him to Tansy Hyde.’

Mrs Linnet put down her cup of tea. ‘What? Is she one of the Warburton Hydes?’

The door opened and Kitty came in, bringing with her a gust of warm air from outside, and a blast of music from the pub garden across the road.

‘Our very favourite teenager,’ said Henry. ‘Oh, I’d love to be young again.’

‘No, you wouldn’t,’ said Asad. ‘You told me it was the unhappiest time of your life.’

‘Then I’d love to have my teenage body back. If I’d known then how handsome and unlined I was, instead of fretting over non-existent blemishes, I’d have spent the entire time in a pair of Speedos.’

‘When you get to my age,’ said Mrs Linnet, ‘you’re just grateful if it still works.’

‘You could wear your Speedos now,’ said Asad. ‘We could make it a regular theme. Put a sign up: “Thursday is Speedos day.”’

Henry wagged a finger. ‘I’ve never thought it classy for a shopkeeper to put his damsons on display.’

‘Prunes, surely?’ Asad was giggling again.

Henry struggled to keep a straight face. ‘I suppose I should be grateful you didn’t start with raisins.’

‘Mrs Linnet, you’re a bad influence,’ Asad said. ‘Do stop now.’

‘Yes, do stop, Mrs Linnet. We have an impressionable young girl in our midst. What can I get you, Kitty? Or have you brought us some more eggs? We’re nearly out of the last lot.’ Henry leaned over the counter.

‘How long have you known that Matt McCarthy is trying to get us out of our home?’

The shop fell silent. Henry shot a glance at Asad.

Kitty intercepted it. ‘Shall I take that as “a lot longer than just now”?’ she asked bitterly.

‘Trying to get you out of your house?’ queried Mrs Linnet.

‘By overcharging us, apparently,’ Kitty said matter-of-factly. ‘It seems we were the last to know.’

Asad opened the counter and came into the shop. ‘Sit down, Kitty,’ he said. ‘Let’s have a cup of tea and talk.’

‘No, thank you.’ She folded her arms. ‘I’ve got to meet someone. I just wanted to know how many people have been laughing at us behind our backs. Silly townies, eh, thinking they could do up that big old house?’

‘It wasn’t like that,’ Asad said. ‘I had a suspicion that something wasn’t right, but I had no proof.’

‘Asad wanted to say something,’ Henry interrupted, ‘but I told him, “You can’t just steam in making wild accusations.” We had no idea what was going on in your house, what he was doing.’

‘But you knew he wanted the house. Before we came.’

They looked helplessly at each other. ‘Well, yes. It was common knowledge.’

‘Not to us,’ said Kitty. ‘It would have been helpful if someone could have warned us that the man who was bashing our home to bits and charging us the earth for it was the same man who had wanted it for himself. Still, I guess now we know who our friends are.’ She turned to go.

‘Kitty!’ Asad called her back. ‘Does your mother know? Have you talked to her about this?’ Henry heard the wheeziness in his voice, signalling his distress.

‘I don’t know what she knows,’ said Kitty. ‘I don’t want to cause more problems.’ Suddenly she became a child out of her depth. ‘I don’t know what to do. Still, I suppose it doesn’t matter now because he’s got to stop soon anyway. We’ve run out of money. We’ll just sit in our semi-derelict house, work out how much we’ve lost and try to get on with our lives.’

There was a hint of drama in her delivery, but Henry couldn’t blame her for that. ‘Kitty, please wait. Let me explain a little—’

The bell jangled again and the door closed behind her.

‘Well!’ exclaimed Mrs Linnet, into the silence. And then again, when no one said anything, ‘
Well.
’

‘She’ll come round,’ said Henry. ‘When she thinks about it. God only knows what that man has done to the place. I’m sorry, Asad,’ he said, as he walked round the shop, pulling down the blinds. ‘You can hit me with the I-told-you-sos. We should have said something, even if it was just a suspicion.’

‘You knew he was up to something, then?’ Mrs Linnet asked.

‘Well, no,’ said Henry, wringing his hands. ‘That was the problem. We just didn’t know. And what can you do? I mean, you don’t like to spread unfounded rumours, do you? Especially not when it concerns someone like him.’

‘He’s in the pub,’ said Mrs Linnet. ‘I saw him go in not ten minutes ago, like butter wouldn’t melt.’

Asad undid his apron.

‘Do you know,’ she continued, ‘I’ve always thought there was something not quite right about him. When he did Mrs Barker’s extension she said he’d put the handles too close to the door frames. The times she’s skinned her knuckles . . .’

‘Where are you going?’ said Henry. Asad was taking off his apron.

‘I have never felt so ashamed. Never.’ There was something impassioned, barely restrained, behind his words. ‘That child was right, Henry. Everything she said was right. We have all behaved shamefully.’

‘But where are you going?’

‘To talk to Mr McCarthy,’ said Asad, ‘before Mrs Delancey hears what’s been going on. I’m going to ask him to behave like an honourable human being. And I’m going to tell him exactly what I think of him.’

‘Asad, don’t,’ said Henry, blocking his path to the door. ‘Don’t get involved. This isn’t your business.’

‘It
is
our business. It is our duty as friends, as good neighbours.’

‘Our duty? Who ever looked out for us, Asad?’ Henry was shouting now, oblivious to who might hear. ‘Who ever stepped in when we faced those bigots after we first got here? Who helped us when they were throwing things through our windows? Scrawling things on our door?’

‘She is alone, Henry.’

‘And so were
we
.’

‘That was many years ago.’ Asad shook his head, uncomprehending. ‘What are you so afraid of?’ he asked, and then he was gone.

The man behind the barbecue was wearing an apron with fake breasts and a pair of frilly knickers printed on the front. From time to time he clapped his hands over the breasts or held up a sausage, clamped in his tongs, and pursed his lips, as if he was doing something rude. Occasionally he would gyrate suggestively to the music, which rang out from the stereo someone had balanced on a small table by the door. Kitty only half noticed. Her nerves were jangling. The Cousins had been so shocked, so upset by what she had said to them, but they had obviously known. Why had they said nothing?