Women of a Dangerous Age (15 page)

‘Easy, Mum. You don't need to bring the whole house down.'

‘Sorry, wasn't thinking.' It was true. She had plenty of other things on her mind.

‘Are you OK? Going back into the house must have been a bit difficult.'

She brushed Nic's unusual concern away with, ‘No, not at all. It's his house now, he can do what he wants with it.'

Nic turned towards her as she reached for the ignition. ‘What's wrong? Did something happen in there?'

‘Really not,' she insisted, not wanting to share her discovery just yet. ‘The boys'll be waiting. Let's go.'

Nic tutted, annoyed that her mother wasn't going to say more, but reversed out into the road. Relieved she didn't have to drive, Lou leaned back against the headrest and shut her eyes. What a day. All sorts of questions jostled for answers but, if she was going to enjoy the celebratory meal that her three were giving her, she had to push them out of her mind until later. The one thing she would not do was tell the children what she had found. Hooker could
bloody well explain himself to all of them when he returned. She would make sure of that.

For the rest of the evening, being with her children acted as a panacea. Even Nic rose to the occasion, dismounting from her high horse and joining in. Perhaps those hormones would be the making of her after all, thought Lou, as she watched her daughter convulsed with laughter over one of Jamie's tales from the film set where he was working. As the two boys joshed each other along, Lou relaxed, happy in their company. When they were like this, sparking off each other, there was nothing to beat their company. They ordered pasta dishes before raising toasts to the shop's success and her future, to the baby, to Jamie and Rose's wedding and to Tom's hoped-for promotion. No one was left out. Except Hooker. His name was neatly avoided. The meal was over all too soon and Jamie drove her home, Nic protesting that she had to get a reasonably early night because she was in court the next day.

With Eric Clapton's ‘Tears in Heaven' – always good for a bit of late-night self-indulgence – making her own tears well, Lou sprawled on the sofa, dress zip undone, mug of hot chocolate at her side. The mystery of Hooker's fourth child worried at her. What upset her most was not so much this unknown's existence but the fact that Hooker had concealed him from her and more importantly from his brothers and sister, denying the child part of his natural family. What made Hooker believe he had the right to do that? Had he thought he was saving her and the children? That the knowledge of this child would somehow derail them? Or was he saving his own skin by keeping this Rory
secret? She was pretty sure she knew the answer. She removed the CD and sat in silence.

Still only half past ten. She wasn't in the mood to go through to her workroom. Not tonight. But she wouldn't be able to concentrate long enough to watch anything on TV. She kept thinking about the boy, going over and over the same ground. She couldn't remember Hooker ever having spent great stretches of time away from London, so she didn't think he could be running another family out of town. The child must be the product of an affair she had pretended wasn't happening. But who was this woman, somebody Burgess? The more she tried to fend off the questions, the more insistent they became. At the same time she felt sorrow about what this would mean to her family. Unlike her moving out of the family home, this would surely cause a seismic shift in the children's relationship with their father.

She took out her patchwork bag and dug her hand into the bits of familiar fabric that belonged to clothes and other items that had punctuated their family history. Hexagons of colour from her mother's dressmaking days, from Jamie's muslin nappy that he took everywhere as a toddler, from the shirt Hooker wore to the first day of his first job at Jeffries and Shunt, a small firm of commercial lawyers, various Babygros and children's clothing, bits of curtain and cushion fabric, dolls' dresses, the kids' and her own clothes. ‘Project Quilt' had become such a family joke that she hadn't got it out for years, tired of the jeers that greeted it, but she still squirrelled away pieces of fabric, inwardly vowing to complete it one day. Instead, her knitting had
taken precedence. However, since she'd moved out, in her few wobbly moments she'd gained comfort from the quilt and from the repetitive mindless work it involved. She picked out the latest fabric octagons she'd cut as well as a number of smaller ones made of card. She took one of each and turned the red silk around the card, pinning and then tacking it. Usually an activity that was guaranteed to induce a mindless relaxation, this time it failed to distract her at all.

She put the lot back in the bag and stuffed it under her chair beside her knitting. Although she had grown used to her own company, for once she wished someone else was with her. She wanted nothing more than to talk, to externalise the problem. As long as everything was circling round inside her head, she couldn't think straight.

She picked up her phone, called up Fiona's number, then aborted the call. Fiona's strong opinions were not what she wanted at this moment. She was already adamant Lou should pin Hooker down on their finances. Lou had resisted, not believing that Hooker would do her out of anything not her due. But now this. Fiona would have a field day. The last time they'd spoken she had made her views clear. ‘I know the form. At the beginning, everything's civilised. Nobody's going to do anybody out of anything, all the assets are going be split right down the middle. Then when the mists clear and lawyers are brought in, the husband becomes ferociously protective of what's his and that's when the fighting starts. Trust me. I've seen it a thousand times. For God's sake, get something in writing while he's still feeling benevolent.'

She was probably right, but the money wasn't what was upsetting Lou. She needed someone who would listen and who would let her come to her own conclusions without bludgeoning her with theirs. This was exactly the sort of moment when Jenny would have known what to say and what to do. Lou lay staring at the ceiling, thinking about her sister. She had learned to lodge the pain of her loss safely in the background until times like this when no one but Jenny would do. She allowed the tears to come for a while, then she sat up straight and blew her nose. This was getting her nowhere. She would go mad if she didn't talk to someone. She made a snap decision and called the one person who knew Hooker and what he was capable of, as well as she did. She listened as the number rang, then Ali answered. At the sound of her voice, Lou immediately knew it had been right to call.

Ali tugged harder. The retractable ladder didn't move. Another even more forceful yank and it creaked towards her, the spring rusty with disuse.

‘I'll go up first and see what's what. OK?' she said, grabbing a roll of bin bags and a dustpan and brush and tucking them under her arm.

Lou nodded, looking apprehensive about what she had let herself in for.

They were standing on the landing of Ali's father's house, and the sound of his voice carried under the door of his study followed by the click of the receiver being replaced. He coughed. Then silence. Engrossed in his latest piece of research, he wouldn't emerge until seven o'clock at least, whatever was going on in the world outside. He had shown little interest when Ali had said she wanted to turn out the attic. Nor had he objected when she'd asked if he minded Lou coming to help. If anything, he'd seemed pleased by the idea that they might impose some order on the accumulated family junk.

As far as Ali could see, the arrangement was win-win
all round: she would have the support of a friend as she combed through the family detritus, hardly daring to hope that she would find something that might tell her more about her mother; her father would get the order he so valued; and Lou would get twenty-four hours of distraction from the latest of Hooker's revelations. Gripping her torch in one hand, she climbed the ladder, steadying herself as it bounced under her weight. At the top, she stopped, letting her eyes adjust to the darkness as she swung the feeble beam of light from side to side. ‘My God!' She took a few more steps upwards until she could hoist herself into the loft.

‘What is it?' Lou was already on the bottom rung, impatient for Ali to make way for her.

‘No one's been here for years.' Ali peered down. ‘But I've found a light switch at least. Come on up.' A short neon strip attached to the central joist flickered into life, lighting up the central part of the boarded-out loft. Drifts of spider's webs hung from the trusses and a film of dust covered everything. She wiped a finger along the top of a child's blackboard and checked it. ‘No wonder the house downstairs is so tidy. He's just chucked everything he didn't want up here. I'd no idea.' Apart from a narrow central pathway running from one end to the other, every inch of floor space was covered with tea chests, cardboard boxes, cases, trunks, old toys and games, mirrors, pictures, an old mattress, and stacks of newspapers and books.

Lou clambered up the ladder to join her, looking around. ‘Blimey! There's no way we can empty this lot out in an afternoon. Where do we start?'

‘I'm not sure. Everything's filthy. Are you sure you're up for this?'

‘Of course. That's why I'm squeezed into these old jeans. Let's do it!'

Encouraged by her enthusiasm, Ali took a step forward. ‘Look! That's the toy pram I was given when I was about six and … oh, Harriet's still in it.' Ali crossed the floor, bending her head to fit under the slanting roof, and picked up a baby doll with a bald plastic head, a pouting pink mouth and a grubby fabric body. Holding Harriet out in front of her, as if she were real, Ali smiled, returning her to the pram as if she didn't want to hurt her. ‘How I loved her. And here's my doll's house. See how perfect it is inside. I remember Mum spending hours sticking on the wallpaper and fixing up the electric lighting.' She knelt down so her face was on a level with the rooms and as she began straightening the sitting room furniture, she sang quietly, ‘Ally, bally, ally bally bee, Sittin' on yer mammy's knee …'

Lou looked up from a box of children's books. ‘What's that?'

‘Oh, just something my mum used to sing to me. It suddenly came back to me.' Her voice tailed off.

Lou approached a pile of cases mounded behind a dismantled baby's cot, touching Ali on the shoulder as she inched past her. ‘What about this pile of cases? Shouldn't we be looking in them? Maybe there's something there that will tell you something about her. After all, that's really why we're here, isn't it?'

Ali looked at the chaos around her. ‘But I wasn't
expecting it to be quite this bad. I don't think they can ever have thrown anything away.'

‘Wouldn't it be easier just to pump Eric for a bit more info?'

‘I've tried.' Ali felt the burden of her and her father's shared past but it was hard to explain, even to Lou. ‘If I press too hard, he just clams up. Between us, we've buried stuff so long that now we're both too frightened to disturb the surface in case things we don't want to remember come flying out. He's made a new life for himself and I don't want to overturn that. I can't. Cantankerous old sod though he may sometimes be, I guess he did his best for me.'

‘But if you don't, it could be too late,' Lou warned.

‘Too late for what?' Ali wanted this conversation to stop. She wanted to kill the curiosity that she'd begun to feel since her father's revelation, to stop its insistent nagging. She didn't want to be disappointed or let down again. ‘Mum left us. That's the bottom line. Whatever her reasons, she didn't want us then and there's nothing to make us think that she ever changed her mind. I'm really clearing this for Dad.' She stood up, backing into the centre of the attic where she could stand straight, knowing Lou was as conscious as she was that she was lying.

At least Lou was sensitive enough not to say anything more.

‘Come on, then. Let's move the cot. Oh!' Ali stopped, switched on the torch again and aimed the beam towards the back of the cases where a meringue-like object the
size of a football was suspended from one of the roof trusses. She turned to Lou. ‘What the hell's that?'

Lou edged past her. ‘Looks like a wasp's nest.' She took the torch and shone it closer, illuminating the papery exterior wall. ‘Isn't it beautiful? Look at the colours.'

‘Be careful.' Ali took a step back. ‘Shouldn't we get Rentokil or someone?'

‘No rush. The wasps are all dead. The queen might be in there but she won't come out till it's a bit warmer. Then she'll abandon this nest and start all over again. New home, new life, new worker wasps. They won't come back here.'

‘How can you be so sure?' Ali took a step towards the way out.

‘We had one in the garage once. They never go back home. Once the evil little buggers were exterminated, Hooker took the nest down to show the kids. It was amazingly intricate, all made of woodchip and spit. The boys kept it in their room for years.'

Ali heard the catch in her voice, and put her arm around Lou's shoulders. ‘You're meant to be having a day off from thinking about him.'

Lou inclined her head so it rested against Ali's. ‘I know I'm meant to be, but I can't forget what he's done. I can't believe he thought he'd get away with it. He must think so little of me, must have for years. I'd no idea.'

‘Not necessarily.' Grateful for a change of subject from her mother, Ali moved away to pull down the top case, careful to avoid the nest just in case Lou was wrong. ‘Take this one. Think about it from his point of view.'

‘I'm trying to. Christ, this is heavy.' Lou let the old blue case fall to the floor with a bang. They smiled at each other when they heard a muffled angry shout from downstairs. ‘Look, I know all the clichés about being driven into another woman's arms once the wife's too exhausted for anything other than the quickest of shags on a Friday night while her attention's all on the kids. But, if that was the case, I don't really understand why he didn't leave us years ago.'

‘Why would he?' Ali knew she was treading on sensitive ground. ‘I've met several men who, despite being completely happy with their wives, needed something else to fulfil them as well. I don't think there's anything wrong with that, is there? At least provided it doesn't hurt anyone else. A mistress can oblige without necessarily being a threat to the marriage.'

‘You would say that.' Lou flicked open the catches of the case.

‘Of course I would,' Ali agreed. ‘But I believe it. Look, it's crazy having this conversation with you, given my history with Hooker. But I can promise you that he never, not once, mentioned being unhappy.'

‘But what's the point of making those vows if you're not going to bother to make at least an effort to keep them? Not that I'm such a shining example any more, I admit. But I did try.' Lou picked up a battered-looking book and opened it. ‘Look at these. Stamp albums. The case's full of them.'

‘They're Dad's. He'd spend hours poring over them. It drove Mum mad.' A picture of the three of them flew
into her mind. She was by the door in a favourite blue and white cotton dress, her hair pinned to the side with a floral slide; her father sat, shirt open at the neck, sleeves rolled up, exhaling smoke from his pipe. Through the haze, she could see her aproned mother standing at the stove, stirring something. ‘Mum would be listening to
The Archers
, making supper and getting impatient that his collection was scattered over the kitchen table.'

Lou didn't respond immediately, then as she replaced the album in the box, she said, ‘What about the boy – Rory?' She seemed to have difficulty saying his name. ‘Has Hooker ever said anything to you about him?'

Ali continued picking up the albums, flicking the pages, careful not to disturb the stamps. A couple of loose paper hinges fluttered to the floor. ‘Nothing. I promise.' The last thing she wanted was to give away the fury she'd felt when Lou had phoned her late that night and told her what she'd discovered. She didn't want to admit to the quite irrational resentment she felt about Hooker having a baby with another woman, even if it was years before they'd met. This knowledge reinforced her own sadness at missing out on motherhood but had also confirmed how much she despised him. She slipped the hinges between the pages. ‘I told you that I never wanted to know about that side of his life. And that's true. It would have made everything too difficult. My way, he could spend a few hours in a bubble that had nothing to do with the real world, and I knew he'd want to come back.' She put the last album down without looking at Lou, regretting her final words.

‘I hate hearing you say that.' Lou shut the case. ‘I know you didn't know me then and it's not your fault but it makes me feel so bloody inadequate. And sad.'

‘I know and I'm sorry, but it shouldn't. Meeting you and Hooker has completely changed the way I see things. I'm so done with married men.' She slammed shut the lid of the case.

‘Yeah, yeah.' Disbelief was scored through Lou's voice, as she helped drag it back to the pile.

‘No, really. I was so blinkered, never thinking, never wanting to think, of the effect of what I was doing on anyone else. I'm ashamed by how selfish I've been. Honestly.'

‘Oh, ease up, for heaven's sake. You were only protecting yourself – that's understandable too. You know, you've never really told me how you got into this serial mistress thing, except that it happened after Don. Perhaps I should take it up now I'm a free woman.' Lou put her thumbs into the belt loops of her jeans and hoicked them up. ‘Suppose there weren't any takers though. How humiliating would that be?'

Ali was too busy retrieving another of the cases to reply. She concentrated on prising open its locks as she began to explain. Talking about herself was easier than talking about her mother or her affair with Hooker. ‘After Don left I carried on working as a store assistant at Makepiece and Strutt. Jewellers by Royal Appointment,' she said, imitating the cut-glass accent of a typical customer. ‘But at night, I'd design and make my own stuff at the kitchen table. I started to sell a few things but, at
the same time, I was restoring jewellery for Makepiece's customers. Things took off as one or two of them began to commission original pieces from me and then passed on my name to their friends. But all that time, I stayed single, focused on the business. I couldn't commit to anyone else after Don. I didn't want to be hurt like that again and besides, I didn't think I'd meet anyone else like him.'

Lou seized a case, blew the dust off it, and snapped it open. ‘This one's empty apart from a few bits of newspaper. Shall we try another?' She stood up. ‘Go on, don't stop. I'm listening.'

Ali wiped her hands on her jeans and went for another case. ‘OK. Eventually, after a short-lived affair with Aaron Sotheby, devoted husband and father of four who I met when he commissioned a necklace for his wife, I cottoned on to the idea that married men weren't necessarily looking for commitment either. No emotional ties and mutually convenient and fun. That suited me down to a T. After him, I took another married lover, then another, until it became a sort of way of life.'

‘Didn't you ever think about what you might be missing?'

‘Not really. At the beginning, I suppose I thought that one day I'd find the one, but I never did and life was good in other ways. It was Hooker's proposal – if that's what it was – that made all those feelings bubble up again. Years and years later. And then I met you.'

‘But now you're going to meet Don again.' Lou placed the next case on the pile for removal.

‘I wish you wouldn't sound so hopeful.' But she couldn't ignore the burst of pleasure she experienced whenever she thought about their imminent meeting, despite not wanting to be disappointed. ‘In fact, I'm beginning to wonder whether meeting him is such a good idea.'

Lou responded with a raised eyebrow.

‘Why? What harm can it do? You said you wanted to tie up loose ends, and that's what you will do. If nothing else.'

‘Maybe. But I'm not sure I can cope with that as well as finding out what happened to my mother. I can't believe that after so long they've both come back into my life at the same time.'

‘Of course you can cope. You must.' Lou was dragging over a trunk that she'd found at the end of the attic. ‘I have a good feeling about this one. Help me with these knots.'