by Liz Fenwick
The rich tones of Nat King Cole’s voice filled the room with him singing ‘Unforgettable’. Gramps arrived and Lottie stood. ‘Shall I give you both some time alone?’
Gramps nodded, and Alex waited for her by the door. He took her hand as they walked downstairs and straight out into the garden. The music floated down through the open window and Alex pulled her into his arms and they danced. Being this close it was easy to stop thinking about Gran, her mother and what she knew. Resting her head on his shoulder, she could forget everything and just remember how good they had been together.
The song changed and the tempo was more upbeat. Alex picked up his pace but didn’t let go of her. As they spun around, he whispered in her ear, ‘You handled your mother well.’
‘By avoiding her question.’
He nodded. ‘It wouldn’t help her.’
‘I think you’re right.’ She tilted her head to the side and looked at him closely, loving the way the green in his eyes blended with the grey.
He pulled her closer as they turned. ‘You don’t sound certain.’
‘The truth is important for her and not knowing it will eat at her.’
‘Only if she finds out there’s anything else to know.’
‘She’s good at finding things out.’
He chuckled. ‘This is true but sadly I don’t think your grandmother will be around for much longer so there is very little chance for her to discover anything.’
Lottie sighed. Her mother would go ballistic is she knew what Gran claimed to have done. As it was, Lottie wanted to know why Gran had killed . . .’him’.
‘You’ve gone all serious.’
‘Just thinking.’
‘This worries me.’
She shook her head. ‘Don’t be – after all, it’s my family that’s messed up.’
‘True, but I do care.’ He stopped dancing.
‘Thank you.’ She looked up at him and his glance met hers. Once he wouldn’t have hesitated. He would have kissed her and that was exactly what she wanted this moment as his head lowered closer to hers. But she and Alex, as a couple, were history – so she stepped away. ‘I’ll just go and check on them.’ She couldn’t go back, and her future was solo like her mother. It was safer.
56
Joan
4 August 1962, 9.00 p.m.
Despite the gleaming silverware, the flickering candles, the laughter and the flowing wine, Allan isn’t as relaxed as he should be at this point. The last of the dinner plates have been cleared. I glance at the door. No sign yet of Mrs Hoskine, Diana and the cake. I long to see Allan smile but there is a tightness around his mouth. He is swift to laugh but the sparkle isn’t reaching his eyes. Tom, however, is arguing with Anthea to his left. He’s enjoying the wine and my earlier worries proved wrong. He had spoken the truth about waiting for the wine. Is my ability to read people off? Maybe it is just the lack of sleep fogging my brain. At least the vicar is happy staring down Beth Venn’s cleavage. My mouth twitches, fighting a smile.
‘Happy birthday to you.’ Diana’s voice is high and slightly wobbly as she enters and holds the cake aloft, with Mrs Hoskine behind her. Everyone stands and joins in and the atmosphere lifts.
‘Blow out the candles, Daddy, but don’t forget to make a wish.’
Allan places his hands around Diana’s to steady the cake and blows. All but one candle go out and Diana swiftly takes care of it. Allan kisses her then places the cake on the table for all to admire. Mrs Hoskine hands him the knife.
‘Don’t forget to make another wish, Daddy, and remember not to tell anyone.’ Diana is intent, despite her smile. She is so serious, even about something so frivolous. Allan holds the knife poised above the cake. The matryoshka dolls look out on the guests from their world of snow-white royal icing. Allan pushes the knife through looking at me, eyes sparkling. I shiver.
Diana rushes into the kitchen but returns just as quickly with her hands tucked behind her back. I watch as she theatrically pulls out what appears to be a handmade book.
‘I made this for you, Daddy. Happy birthday.’ She goes on her tiptoes and he bends down so she can kiss him.
He grins. ‘You made this?’ He holds it up. ‘How clever.’
Diana turns to looks at Ralf then Beth Venn. ‘Thank you for the camera. I had so much fun with it.’
‘You’re welcome, darling.’ Beth smiles and I don’t like her at all.
Diana hides a frown under her hand, but I see it. Allan turns each page admiring the pictures, but his fingers still on one page in particular. No one else notices it while Mrs Hoskine and Mary serve the cake. He flips two more pages and I make a note to have a closer look later.
Over the table, Tom’s glance meets mine and I walk up to Diana. ‘What a talented chick you are.’
‘She is wonderful.’ Allan closes the book.
‘Maybe Diana should take it up to her room so there’s no chance of food getting on it.’ I stroke Diana’s shoulder.
‘Good idea.’ Allan looks up at me briefly then gives the book to Diana. She holds it under her arm and Mrs Hoskine hands her a plate of cake before bustling her back into the kitchen. Champagne corks pop and I jump, spilling a bit of the red wine in my glass. George makes eye contact from the other side of the table. He misses nothing. Allan laughs loudly at something Beth Venn says then knocks back a glass of champagne. I mop up the spilled wine with my napkin but there remains a tell-tale drop of red on my glove.
57
Lottie
4 August 2018, 9.05 p.m.
Dinner was ready and Lottie had no idea where her mother had gone. At the top of the garden, the gate to the path was ajar. The only sounds were the waves. Lottie reluctantly turned left and walked towards the watchtower. Her stomach tightened uncomfortably. This time ten years ago she was sitting at the dining room table and was already pretty drunk. This evening the footpath was deserted, but she could hear happy sounds coming up from the beach.
Lottie stood in the middle of the path knowing her mother was at the watchtower. She had to go there. Alex had said John wasn’t her fault but at this moment, guilt weighed her feet down. A bat swooped low in front of her and she fell against the fence. Her heart raced as she looked through the brambles to the beach below.
In all her visits to Boskenna since 2008 she had never again stepped off the footpath and onto the headland. She crossed the invisible barrier now and in a few strides, she was beside the old concrete structure. The air was cool and she rubbed her bare arms. Her mother was perched on the steps leading up to the lookout platform.
‘Hi.’ Lottie whispered but her mother jumped any way.
Her mother turned away from the view. Her eyes were filled with tears. ‘I remember.’
‘You do?’ Lottie took a step back, thinking of the diary tucked under her pillow.
‘Not much. But I remember the body, my father on a rock.’ She shook her head. ‘From the path,’ she pointed. ‘It looked like he was sun bathing in his evening suit.’ She took a gulp of air. ‘I don’t know if I want to remember more.’
‘Oh, Mum.’
‘But what bothers me is that he was on his back.’ She took a breath. ‘I have spent the past hour moving every which way trying to work it out but . . . but I think he would have fallen forward.’
‘Oh.’ Lottie walked near to the vegetation-covered fence. There had been a few landslips over the years, and when she had looked at the cliff from below, the grassy edge hung over the gentle concave indent of the cliff. Birds nested under the overhang. She’d noticed them that afternoon when she’d been on the beach with Alex. She peered down then took a step back.
‘What if he staggered backwards?’
‘I’ve been thinking about that, wishing I’d paid more attention in physics.’
Lottie laughed. ‘You were no help with maths either.’
‘True.’ She stood and walked down the few steps. ‘I’m sorry.’
Lottie tilted her head. ‘What for?’
Sh
e stood a foot from Lottie. ‘For being a shit mother.’
Lottie moved backwards. That was the last thing she expected. ‘You weren’t.’
She shook her head. ‘I was.’
‘You loved me.’ Lottie looked away, trying to keep her voice steady.
‘From a distance, I think I may have.’ Her mother glanced over the edge of the cliff and shuddered. ‘I let my mother raise you . . . which was wrong, as she didn’t raise me very well – or at all, in truth.’
‘I’m sorry you and Gran weren’t close.’ Lottie took her hand and she looked down at their fingers. Her mother’s were long and elegant and Lottie’s were short and workman like.
‘Me too. Forgiveness came too late.’
‘Oh, Mum.’
She locked her fingers with Lottie’s. ‘Forgive me.’
‘Nothing to forgive.’ Lottie echoed the words she’d said to her grandmother.
‘There is. Both of us know it.’
Lottie looked down at their hands. ‘Mum.’
‘I’m sorry.’
She glanced up at her mother. ‘I love you and forgive you.’
‘Thank you.’
She kept hold of Lottie’s hand. All Lottie could think about were the years she had longed for this moment. She was grateful that Gran had been around to hold her hand and listen.
‘What are you thinking?’
She cast a quick glance at her mother, trying to read her mood. Should she dodge the question to keep the moment, or tell the truth and hope any anger would dissolve in the pink evening light?
‘Grateful for you and for Gran.’ Lottie held her breath, watching the emotions cross her mother’s face.
‘I’m glad I thanked her for loving you.’
That broke Lottie and the tears that she wouldn’t let come before began. Her mother pulled Lottie into her arms and she cried more, trying to speak.
58
Lottie
5 August 2018, 9.30 p.m.
Her mother had gone upstairs to see Gran and she didn’t want to eat. Lottie walked through to the kitchen. Alex turned from the stove. ‘Hello, did you find her?’
‘Yes, but she’s not hungry.’
‘So you told her I was cooking?’ His eyes gleamed, although he managed to keep a straight face otherwise.
He took the pot off the heat and walked over to her. ‘I think George might need something.’
‘Yes.’ She closed her eyes for a moment.
‘I’m just warming the soup.’
She noted that he’d laid the table for the four of them. ‘After that shall we take a walk?’ He placed a hand on her arm.
She stared at it as if she’d never seen it before. She swallowed. ‘Not sure.’ There was so much he didn’t know. ‘Shall I get Gramps?’
He nodded, and she walked away.
In the snug Gramps sat with a glass of whisky in his hand.
‘Some soup?’
He shook his head. ‘Haven’t the appetite.’
She nodded. ‘I’ll let you off this time.’ She held his hand and it was cold despite the warmth of the evening. She pulled the throw off the sofa and covered his legs.
‘I’ll be back shortly.’
‘No rush,’ he took a sip of his drink, ‘I’m not going anywhere.’ She kissed him and went back to the kitchen, catching the scent of the roses in the vase on the hallway table.
Alex was about to pour the soup.
‘Just the two of us.’
‘Oh.’
The toast popped up and she grabbed it. It smelled good. It was something normal when nothing else felt the way it should. She put it in the toast rack and sat opposite Alex. Steam rose from the bowl and blurred his features.
‘There was a picture of you in uniform at your grandmother’s.’
He raised an eyebrow. ‘I think that was the last thing I expected you to say.’
She smiled. ‘Pleased I can still surprise you.’
He grinned. ‘After uni, I joined the Navy and now I’m an IT geek.’
‘But you’d never mentioned the Navy when we were together.’ She raised an eyebrow.
‘Ah, no it had never crossed my mind.’
She frowned.
‘But I realized that you were right when you said I wasn’t man enough or educated enough. I was going nowhere, and the Navy solved that.’ He laughed. ‘From a boy who’d only been to London twice, I suddenly saw the world.’
She pushed her hair back, regretting her words yet again. ‘Did you enjoy it?’
‘Yes, but Cornwall kept a hold of my heart.’ He looked up at her and gave her one of those sexy half smiles of his.
‘Living in Cornwall was always part of your plan.’ She blew on her soup. She shouldn’t have said that because she too had been part of his plan, their plan. She dared to look up and her breath caught when she saw the emotion in his eyes. He still cared for her. She swallowed. This wasn’t good. She would just hurt him again and that was the last thing she wanted to do.
‘So that’s me, what about you? George mentioned a big show coming up.’
She buttered a piece of toast planning what to say without saying anything. ‘I love what I do.’
‘I always knew you would.’
She looked up. ‘Really?’
‘Yes. It was the way you were forever taking bits from the beach and put them together.’ He smiled. ‘You made that sea glass bracelet for my cousin Tegan for her birthday.’
‘I’d forgotten about that until I saw her still wearing it this morning.’
‘Everyone asks where she bought it.’ Alex dunked a piece of his toast into the soup.
She pictured the mussel shell and the sea glass she’d seen this afternoon. That thought led to what she’d lost. She’d been so stupid. Pushing those thoughts aside, she cleared her throat. ‘My grandfather, Allan Trewin . . .’ She looked down and then back up again.
‘Why don’t I think I’m going to like this line of conversation?’ Alex smiled, and her heart melted a bit.
‘He was a political attaché in Moscow.’
He passed her the butter dish. ‘He was a spy.’
She looked up, eyes wide.
‘It was at the height of the Cold War.’ He handed her another piece of toast. ‘But I’m sure that had nothing to do with his death. He was here in Cornwall not in Red Square.’
He had a point, she had to admit. ‘Do you think my grandmother knew?’
‘I would think so.’
‘Oh.’ She blew on the surface of her soup. It was still too hot to eat.
‘But not much.’ He stood and brought a jug of water to the table. ‘If I were you, I’d forget what she said.’
‘Why?’
‘Because whatever she meant, it’s in the past.’
This was true. She heard Gramps footsteps in the hallway. He had been in diplomatic service then too. Had he been a spy for the Americans? No, she couldn’t see that at all. But thinking of Allan with his dashing looks, he fitted the movie star picture of a secret agent, which meant he had probably been too obvious.
59
Diana
4 August 1962, 9.50 p.m.
Back again, Diary.
They are all eating cheese downstairs, yuck. I like seeing the room all glowy with the tall candlesticks burning bright and people laughing a lot. Mrs Hoskine says that the wine might have something to do with the laughter. She saw me scoot under the table again when she brought the silverbelle back into the kitchen, but no one else had. I loved watching and trying to figure out who was bored because Mummy said it happens a lot at dinner parties. Daddy was chatting to Lady Fox but he was looking down the table. He hadn’t really liked his birthday cake. He frowned when he first saw it. Maybe he didn’t like the dolls on it, but then he laughed. He did like his book though and he called me a clever girl. Maybe we shouldn’t have made the cake like Moscow. Maybe we should have made seashells to put on it, or sailboats like last year. Last year Daddy had been happier but
Mummy had sailed with us then.
They think I don’t know Mummy lost a baby. I don’t know how she did, but she cried a lot about it and they fought. Daddy slammed doors and she cried more. But things have been better since we have come home.
Diana closed the diary and put it under her pillow. She pulled out her book. The band had begun downstairs so it was too noisy to sleep.
60
Lottie
4 August 2018, 9.55 p.m.
The phone rang and Lottie dashed to the office.
‘Hello, Boskenna.’
‘Is that Diana Trewin?’
‘No, I’m her daughter, Lottie.’
‘This is Pat Treneer.’
‘Mum was talking with you earlier.’ She leaned on the desk.
‘Yes, she was asking me what I remembered about Allan Trewin’s death.’
‘She mentioned it.’ Outside in the garden she saw Alex chatting to Gramps but her mother was heading down the path to the beach.
‘Is she there? It’s just that I remembered something else.’
Lottie leaned forward to see if she could call out to her, but she had disappeared from sight. ‘She’s just gone for a walk in the garden. Can I take a message?’
‘Well, I hadn’t thought about the case in many years, you see.’
‘I can imagine.’
Alex sat on the bench next to Gramps now. They appeared to be in a serious conversation.
‘And I was angry at the time I handed over to CID and they didn’t listen.’
‘Oh.’
She stood straighter. ‘But it was an accident.’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘But my gut told me all wasn’t right.’
‘Are you sure?’ She turned from the view. She didn’t want to hear this.
‘I’ve seen enough poor souls that have accidently fallen off cliffs, but he didn’t look like any of them.’
‘It’s a pretty steep cliff.’ She thought about what was there now. Was it a straight drop or more of a slope then?
‘It was dead straight, and I felt he should have been face down.’ Her mother had been thinking the same thing earlier.
‘But surely if he took a step backwards. . . ?’ She closed her eyes wishing she hadn’t heard what her grandmother had said.
