by Fiona Field
Susie was waiting for him and let him in the back door. If she noticed his rather dishevelled and unkempt appearance she said nothing about it, to Mike’s relief. At least he was pretty sure his jacket no longer smelt of Scotch, which was something to be grateful for. His wife led him to the staffroom beside the main kitchen which was silent.
‘We’ve got the place to ourselves for a bit. The staff don’t come back on duty till five thirty to clear up the tea things and get ready for the evening meal.’
‘Best you tell me what you know then.’
‘There’s nothing to tell really, beyond what I told you this morning. I found a packet of fags in Ella’s bedroom and it was half empty. What we need to talk about is how we handle things.’
‘Ground them?’
Susie nodded. ‘We could but seeing as how they are utterly bolshie I think they’ll just ignore it. Realistically, I don’t think I’ll be able to prevent them from going out of the house when we get back in the evening if they are determined.’
Mike looked at her, she had a point. ‘I suppose we could deadlock the front door,’ he offered.
‘They’d climb out a window.’
‘We could stop their allowance.’
‘That might certainly have an impact. I’ll keep on thinking – we’ll come up with something, but before we can do any of that we are going to have to confront them with the evidence.’
‘That’s not going to be an easy conversation,’ said Mike.
‘Easy or not, it’s got to be done. Do you think they’d have started smoking if they’d stayed at Browndown?’
‘Who’s to know? If we start down the “what if” route I think we might end up going potty.’
‘I often wonder...’ mused Susie.
Mike put his hand on her arm. ‘Me too.’ They looked at each other, both knowing what the other was going to say. ‘But what’s done is done. We are where we are.’
‘Very profound, Mr Collins,’ said Susie wryly. ‘And while we’ve got a moment to ourselves – about last night.’
Mike felt his heart rate increase; he knew what was coming next and guilt swept through him.
‘You were drinking, weren’t you?’
Busted. He nodded. ‘Yup, fell off the wagon. I’m sorry and I won’t do it again.’
‘Oh, Mike.’ Susie’s disappointment was tangible. ‘That’s twice. If only your stupid car hadn’t broken down.’
Mike couldn’t meet her eyes. Lie upon lie... Not just the car but the fact that it was a lot more than twice, although it was only twice he’d been shit-faced. Besides, a pint or so at lunchtime hardly made him a lush – not like he’d been back in the old days, and if she had to work with the twats he was lumbered with, she’d be driven to drink too. At least she didn’t think he’d had his binge all planned, that he sorted things so he could fall off the wagon. In fact, he hadn’t fallen so much as actively jumped but as long as Susie was in ignorance life would be easier all round.
‘It won’t happen again,’ he promised. Although, internally, he was thinking that he wouldn’t get caught again. He just had to be more careful if he was going to have the occasional drink.
‘OK,’ said Susie, ‘let’s forget about it. Back to the girls. How about confiscating their iPads and phones?’
‘It would certainly hurt them. We can’t do it without giving them a chance of redeeming themselves. We have to have a carrot available as well as a stick.’
Susie nodded. ‘So, if you go straight home while I get the girls, you can raid their rooms for their iPads. As soon as I get back with them, we can tell them we know about the smoking and ask them to hand over their phones as punishment. They mightn’t mind too much if they think they still have their tablets, which they won’t – assuming you can find them.’
‘Sneaky,’ said Mike.
‘Off you go then. You’ll probably find their iPads on their desks or by their beds. That’s where they usually are.’
Mike splashed out back to his car, wondering when his wife had learned to be quite so Machiavellian. He had to hand it to her, she was in a class of her own.
*
Ella and Katie had spent most of their breaks huddled together in sheltered corners of the school playground, wondering what had happened to their precious stash of cigarettes.
‘You can’t have looked properly,’ Katie kept insisting.
‘But I did, I know I did. I know I had them when we came in from meeting Ali, they were in my sweatshirt pocket.’
‘Then they must have fallen out.’
‘But where?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Katie. ‘You had them. They must be on your bedroom floor.’
Ella sighed and looked exasperated. ‘But I told you, I looked. I picked everything up and they weren’t there.’
‘When we get home we’ll have a proper look.’
Ella had shrugged. She’d had a proper look but if Katie wanted to waste her time doing it again, it was up to her. ‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘what are we going to tell Ali?’
‘Maybe he’ll lend us a ciggie. We can pay him back tomorrow.’
‘Maybe.’ But Ella wasn’t convinced. He smoked far more of their fags than they ever got off him. But in his favour, life on the school bus, now he allowed them to sit with his crew, was much easier. It was worth hanging around in the cold and wet by the junction box or huddled in the bus shelter for that alone.
When their mother came to pick them up from Caro’s everything seemed pretty normal. It was only when they got home and saw their dad, waiting for them to come in, that they began to twig that not all was right.
‘I want a word with you two,’ he said without preamble.
The twins exchanged a nervous glance and felt their anxiety levels and heart rates soar. They both had a horrible idea they knew where this was going. They followed him into the sitting room. Their mother trailed in last and stood by the front door. To stop us escaping? wondered Ella, nervously.
‘Sit down,’ he ordered.
They both dropped, side by side, onto the sofa. Ella wanted to hold Katie’s hand for support but knew it would show weakness.
‘What’s the meaning of this?’ Their father brandished the missing packet of smokes.
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ blustered Ella.
Her father’s eyes narrowed. ‘Don’t lie,’ he said. ‘Your mother found them on your bedroom floor this morning.’
Instinctively, Ella glanced at Katie.
‘Yes,’ said their father. ‘You may well look to your sister for support. I imagine she’s in on this too.’
Ella stared at him defiantly. ‘They’re not ours.’
Their dad just stared at them and sighed. ‘Really. So whose are they? And why would you have them in your possession?’ He patently didn’t believe a word she’d said.
‘They’re Ali’s... or his mum’s. I... I must have picked them up by accident.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes.’
Well, as you insist on lying to me as well as smoking I am forced to take action. Not only are you grounded but I want your mobile phones.’
‘No!’ The girls spoke in unison.
‘Yes. Hand them over.’
‘You can’t make us,’ said Katie.
Their father looked at them and held his hand out. ‘I think I can. I am your father,’ he suddenly thundered, ‘and I will not be disobeyed.’
The girls both jumped at his change in tone of voice. Wordlessly they reached into their school bags and handed them over.
‘Thank you. And don’t think you’ll be going out to meet your friends this evening or any evening for the foreseeable future. You’re grounded till further notice, so I suggest you go to your rooms and think about your behaviour.’
Ella felt a wave of rage against her father. What right had he to treat them like this? He was hateful and mean and... and... suddenly she felt tears welling up. She jumped up off the sofa, barged past her mum and raced u
p the stairs. Katie followed a second later. A door slammed upstairs.
Susie stared at her husband. ‘Thank you. They may not like it but it had to be done.’
Mike sank into the armchair next to him. ‘I feel a heel.’
‘Parenting isn’t easy. It’s tough love.’
Mike breathed deeply. ‘I sometimes think tough love is tougher on us than it is them.’
They heard a bedroom door open upstairs.
‘You’ve taken our iPads!’ screamed Ella.
‘Yes,’ shouted back Susie.
‘I hate you. I hate you both.’
‘And I do too. I wish you were dead,’ added Katie.
The door slammed again; this time the windows rattled in the sitting room.
‘That’s it,’ muttered Susie. She flew up the stairs. She flung open Ella’s door and saw the twins huddled together on Ella’s bed. They were crying but her heart didn’t soften. Serve them right, she thought.
‘You can shout at your father and me as much as you like,’ she said in a dangerously low and quiet voice. ‘You can call us names. But if you start damaging property with your stupid, spiteful behaviour, by slamming doors and the like, the loss of your iPads and phones will seem like nothing compared to the sanctions I will impose. Do you understand?’ She glared at them till they both dropped their defiant stares. ‘Do you understand?’ she repeated.
‘Yes,’ mumbled Ella sulkily.
‘Katie?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Good. And if you think you can stay up here and sulk, you’ve got another think coming. I expect you at the supper table at the normal time.’
Ella looked at her with a cold hard stare.
‘Your choice,’ said Susie. ‘If you don’t come down you can go hungry.’
‘That’s child abuse,’ said Katie.
Susie leaned forwards. ‘No, it’s discipline. The food will be there for you, downstairs on the table. Your choice.’
They thought about it.
‘When can we have our iPads back?’ asked Ella in a more conciliatory tone.
‘When I say so,’ said Susie. She backed out of the room and shut the door.
Round one, she thought, had been won on points by her and Mike. Not that she felt she had the energy for any further rounds in the foreseeable future.
As she went downstairs she wanted a drink more than anything. Like that was going to help. One of the family had to stay strong but she wished that, just for once, it wasn’t her.
Chapter 35
When Maddy met Luke again she remembered how much she liked him at their first brief meeting at the officers’ mess summer ball, well over a year previously. He had classic good looks with dark hair, a wide smile and brown eyes. Kind eyes, too, she thought. No wonder Sam had fallen for him. In fact, if she didn’t love Seb so much, she might have taken a shine to him herself. And over the course of the evening, Luke had made them all laugh and had been charming and entertaining; he’d even helped with clearing the table – the perfect houseguest.
The next morning he and Sam appeared at the breakfast table looking as if they hadn’t slept a wink. Maddy smiled inwardly and pretended not to notice the dark shadows under Sam’s eyes, her tousled hair and her tendency to yawn every few minutes. And why not? thought Maddy. When was the last time she’d seen her fiancé?
Breakfast was in the dining room because there wasn’t room for the four Fanshaws and their houseguests around the kitchen table so Maddy had been busy ferrying what was needed from the kitchen while Sam and Luke made calf’s eyes at each other, when they weren’t being interrupted by Nathan asking them what they knew about Peppa Pig. Give them their due, thought Maddy as she plonked a jug of orange juice down, Luke and Sam were very patient, which made her warm to them even more. They were all settling down to coffee and toast and Maddy was just about to pour the orange juice when the phone rang.
Maddy frowned. Who on earth...? And at this time on a Saturday morning. She put down the jug, pulled her dressing-gown cord tight about her and went to answer it.
‘Will? What can I do for you?’
‘Can I speak to Seb?’
‘Of course.’
Maddy went to fetch her husband and then carried on serving breakfast.
She’d barely finished pouring coffee for everyone when Seb returned. ‘Wouldn’t you know it,’ he said, shaking his head.
‘Know what?’
‘Will’s got it on good authority that that wretched exercise is going to kick off today with an emergency crash-out.’
‘Really?’ said Maddy. ‘Who’s his source?’
‘He was duty officer again last night.’
‘Again?’
‘He got a bunch of extras.’
‘More extras?’
‘Mads, the CO and RSM give them out for almost anything these days. Anything at all.’
Maddy shook her head. ‘Poor Will.’
‘Anyway, the poor old duty clerk was called in to open up battalion HQ for the CO and when Will went to do the midnight check on the guardroom he saw the light on and went to investigate. The poor old duty clerk was having to type up a bunch of orders for today.’
‘Bugger,’ muttered Maddy.
‘Bugger, bugger, bugger,’ crowed Nathan, delighted by a new word.
Maddy rolled her eyes. ‘Sorry,’ she said to no one in particular.
‘Precisely,’ said Seb. ‘So that’s the weekend fu— ruined.’
‘Right,’ said Sam, ‘I’d better get dressed and get down to the workshop. I don’t suppose Will knows when we’re all going to get crashed out?’
‘No, the duty clerk said it would be more than his life was worth to pass that on. And knowing how Rayner likes to behave as if he were Hitler, no doubt if he found out what the clerk has already let slip, he’d have the poor guy shot at dawn.’
Seb and Sam both disappeared to get themselves over to the barracks and to do as much as possible – while not appearing to be doing anything – to prepare for the CO’s surprise crash-out.
‘And don’t expect us back for lunch,’ said Seb as he left the dining room. ‘If we haven’t been called out by then we’ll grab something in the mess.’
Which left Luke, Maddy and the kids and the remains of breakfast.
‘Tell you what,’ said Luke.
‘What?’ said Maddy helping herself to a slice of toast.
‘Why don’t I treat you and the nippers to a pub lunch?’
‘You can’t do that, you’re my guest.’
‘I think I can. Call it a thank-you present for having me and Sam to stay.’
‘But it’s been lovely.’ Maddy finished buttering the slice, cut it into fingers and gave them to the children.
‘It certainly has,’ said Luke with feeling. ‘And it might have been lovelier if Rayner hadn’t stuck his oar in.’
‘That’s Rayner for you.’
‘So, after we’ve finished breakfast and I’ve helped you clear up...’ Luke saw the look on Maddy’s face. ‘No, no arguments, this is how today is going to roll. After that, I shall Google some nice pubs in the area – ones that are properly child friendly – and we’ll treat ourselves to a slap-up lunch.’
‘OK,’ said Maddy, grinning. ‘Sounds like a plan.’
*
A couple of hours later Maddy loaded the kids into her car and they set off, the windscreen wipers flick-flacking as they drove out of the garrison. Luke programmed the satnav as she backed out of the drive and ordered her to follow it.
‘That way it’ll all be a surprise.’
‘I like surprises,’ said Maddy. ‘Just not the sort that Rayner springs.’
‘No. I don’t think you’re alone there.’
Fifteen minutes after that, Maddy was driving through the little village of Ashton-cum-Bavant.
‘Oh my God,’ she said as she drove past the village green. ‘So that’s the house.’
‘What house?’
Maddy stopped the car a
nd pointed through the rain-flecked glass to a beautiful three-storey Georgian house with a shingle tied to its ornate, wrought-iron fence declaring it to be ‘Sold STC’.
‘A mate of Seb’s has just bought that place.’
‘Bloody hell,’ said Luke. ‘How does he make his cash? Robbing banks?’
‘Sort of – his dad runs one. Ever heard of Forster’s Bank?’
Luke whistled. ‘I’m impressed.’
‘I’m jealous,’ admitted Maddy.
‘It’d be hell to heat. Think of the bills.’
Maddy laughed. ‘Yeah, I’d forgotten that. Puts you right off it, doesn’t it.’
She turned the key in the ignition and set off again following the directions on the satnav but when she got to the next junction there was a sign: Road closed. Flooding.
She stopped and pulled on the handbrake. ‘OK, which way now?’
‘Just keep going straight on, the satnav will recalculate. And if it doesn’t, well, maybe we can find another pub. There doesn’t seem to be a shortage around here.’
‘No, although whether we’ll find one as appropriate as your carefully researched child-friendly one, I don’t know.’
‘And we have to hope the pub’s open. It’s called the Ferryman so it suggests it’s by the river and it might have trouble with floods too.’
But the other way to the pub was fine and the car park was surprisingly empty for a Saturday lunchtime.
‘I suppose people coming from Salisbury might be put off by the road closure. Still, it’s an ill wind and all that,’ said Luke, cheerfully.
Maddy looked at the Bavant river racing past the far end of the car park – a brown maelstrom, lapping right at the top of the bank – and wondered how often this pub got flooded. It wouldn’t, she thought, take much more rain to make this place go under, and it was still coming down in buckets with no sign of it letting up in the near future.
