‘Ross with you, Nell ? He didn’t say –’
‘No. He’s far too busy. I’ve just called over to have a word with Clem.’
‘Everything all right? Between you? I mean, after all that awful trouble. I always said that Claudia was no better than she ought to be – and Sam! Well, I know he’s your brother, love, but he was always so dreamy. I often said to Adele that I thought it might be drugs – Nell? Nell!’
Nell skipped quickly down the Ice-Breaker’s blue-and-silver steps before she could help Marcia’s teeth in their bid for freedom. Melody and Clementine and their husbands were toeing the Percival line and working their pristine socks off on the other white-knucklers, she noticed, fluttering her fingers at them as she passed. Smug cows, she thought, knowing that they expected to be matrons of honour – Marcia had even suggested that they’d look really nice in varying shades of pink. Not that that was going to be an option now. Oh, the joy of liberty, she grinned to herself, expertly side-stepping the crowds. She’d never be able to thank Claudia enough.
Claudia had had the guts to put up with Danny – but still made her own decision not to have a baby; Claudia had been bravely knocking back the pill; Claudia had inadvertently set her free. And if Claudia had had the courage to gamble on a dream, then she could do it too.
Nell finally found Clem barracking a couple of unfortunate gaff lads who had been foolish enough to think that dehydration meant they could skip off for five minutes and have a drink. She touched his arm. ‘Sorry to interrupt. This won’t take a second, but I wondered if I could have a word?’
Clem, like Marcia, immediately ignored her and looked over her shoulder for Ross.
Jesus, she thought, it’s happening already. We’re a pair, a couple, you don’t get one without the other. ‘He’s not with me. He’s far too busy wheeling and dealing with the Bradley-Percival amalgamation.’
Clem nodded. ‘Ah, right. So, what can I do for you, Princess?’
She led him away from the relieved gaff lads; from the blinding neon lights; from the roar of the music and the thump of the generators; and finished up on the outer limits of the fair where a pair of very elderly travellers – even older than Mr and Mrs Mac – were trying to entice teenagers into the Fun House.
‘I want to stop the trucks order.’
‘You can’t.’ Once he was-out of sight of his family, Clem immediately lit a cigarette and inhaled indulgently. ‘They’re practically done and finished. Christ, you haven’t changed your mind about the gallopers and stuff, have you? We’ve got ’em ready. All the wagons. Ross reckons that the old-time stuff will go a bomb – I’ve already got you some tentative bookings. Bloody hell, what is it with you Bradleys? Why can’t you just make money like everyone else? Something else taken your fancy now, has it?’
Nell said nothing.
Clem sighed. ‘For Christ’s sake, Nell. I haven’t got all day. What’s your game?’
‘No game. I don’t want to travel with Danny any more. I want the Bradley-Percival amalgamation to buy me out with the dodgems. I want to know if the money raised from the sale of the dodgems will pay for the trucks. I’m also not going to marry Ross – although I haven’t told him yet. And –’ she added quickly, watching Clem’s face change colour beneath the onslaught of pulsing lights, ‘I don’t want you to. All I want to know is where I stand if I don’t marry him.’
‘Where you stand?’ Clem bellowed, scaring a hot-dog-eating couple out of their wits. ‘I’ll tell you where you fucking stand! Out in the cold with that slag of a sister-in-law and your poncey brother – that’s where you stand! Understood?’
‘Perfectly. Thank you. It’s nice to know I’ve made the right decision. So, if I don’t marry Ross then I can’t go anywhere except non-Guild sites, is that what you’re saying? School fetes, village galas –’
‘And then only if you’re very lucky!’ Clem roared again, this time even startling the deaf pensioners stumbling up the steps of the Fun House. ‘And no, the money from the dodgems wouldn’t go halfway to clearing the truck debt, so you’ll have nothing to transport your junk around in anyway. No transport and no sites. No money. No life.’
Oh, I’ll have a life, Nell thought, surprised at how calm she felt. No money maybe – and probably the dregs of the gaffs – but a life. My life. And how quickly the gallopers had changed from fortune-making preservation pieces into a heap of junk. And how very much Clem looked like Ross when he was angry …
She turned away, ignoring his bellows, hoping that she’d get back to Monkton Regis before Clem reached Ross on the mobile. Hoping that this feeling of serene euphoria wouldn’t desert her before she did the most difficult thing she’d ever had to do in her life.
‘Brilliant tonight,’ Terry greeted her, showing her the takings, obviously keen for Nell to know that he hadn’t pocketed any of them. ‘I could get used to this. Running me own ride. Still, I guess that’s just a dream, innit? I mean gaff lads don’t own rides, do they?’
‘Not very often, no.’ Nell watched as he checked the cars for lost property, and deftly switched off the generator. ‘Terry – can I have a word, please?’
‘I never nicked nothing, Nell. Honest.’ ‘I know.’ She took a deep breath in the darkness. ‘It’s nothing like that. Listen –’
She’d broken his heart, she realised that. Destroyed his dreams too. It didn’t matter how many times she repeated that the dodgems would be staying – it was she who was leaving – and that he’d still have his job, they both knew he wouldn’t. Danny hated him, Ross would collude with Danny – and Terry had always had a surprising amount of integrity.
That was it then, she thought, walking towards the Crash’n’Dash, as Ross closed down for the night. Adele had guessed – so Peter surely would have been told. Clem knew – so the whole of the Percival hierarchy would have been informed. And she’d told Terry. All she had to do now was to explain things to Ross.
‘Me and Danny are going to open a bottle of malt.’ He secured the pay-box. ‘Fancy joining us? Letting bygones be bygones?’
She shook her head. ‘I want to talk to you.’
‘That makes a change.’
She watched him in the dusky purple light. He was so very handsome, she thought, and he’d always be rich. He’d expand Bradleys until it was up in the stratosphere of the Guild. She’d want for nothing. ‘I think we should talk in private.’
‘Suits me. My place or yours?’
‘Yours.’
He couldn’t even do that without explaining to Danny. He shouted up into the waltzer that he’d be five minutes and to leave some Laphroaig. Five minutes? Was that all she was worth? Walking towards her, he switched on his phone. It rang immediately.
‘Don’t answer it. Please. It’ll be your father. Listen to me first.’
Ross switched the phone off again. ‘I don’t understand. Is it Claudia and Sam? Have you heard from them?’
‘No. It’s to do with us.’
‘Great.’ He slid his arm round her shoulders. ‘My favourite subject.’
Why was it, she thought, that the words simply didn’t ring true any more?
She sat uneasily on the edge of the pearlised leather, refusing a drink. Ross sprawled alongside her, relaxed, sipping whisky and ice from cut-glass, looking golden and glorious. She stared at the floor, at the ceiling – anywhere but at Ross – and told him that she wanted him to buy her out. That she wanted to leave. That she wouldn’t marry him.
He didn’t speak. He wasn’t like Clem, she thought, swallowing tears. It would have been so much easier if he’d shouted and sworn and got angry. Then she would have felt vindicated. As it was, she felt guilty and shameful. He wasn’t right for her and she didn’t love him, but she had never wanted to hurt him.
‘Ross? Say something.’
‘It’ll bugger up the nostalgia stuff a bit.’
‘What?’ She jerked up her head. ‘No screams of betrayal and heartbreak?’
He reached out and took h
er hand. ‘Nell, sweetheart, I don’t hear any of those coming from you. Why should I be any different?’
Nell blinked. ‘But you love me – don’t you? You want to marry me? Isn’t that what all this was about? The Brain-Scrambler and the amalgamation? You and my misguided mother plotting to get us together?’
Ross sat up, still holding her hand. Nell thought he looked as though he was going to laugh. She hoped he was going to laugh. She’d kill herself if he cried.
‘That was your ma’s idea, yes. It wasn’t strictly mine. Jesus, Nell. I’ve known you for ever. We’ve always been good mates. And yes, I kept asking you to marry me – but only because I knew you’d say no. Shit, marrying you would be like marrying one of my sisters! There’s no spark, sweetheart, is there? There’s a good working partnership, but we’d be continually fighting for supremacy – and we know each other inside out. There’d be no excitement …’
She looked at him in amazement. He was laughing, the bastard. She shook her hand free and struggled to her feet. She poured a measure of whisky into a second tumbler and added water. ‘So what did you do it for?’
He held out his tumbler for a refill and Nell topped it up. He raised the crystal in a mock salute. ‘Cheers. I take it this is kiss, truth, or dare time? OK, then. I went along with it to get away from my bloody parents. To gain my freedom. To stop being Mr Percival Junior and having Mother and Father planning my every move. The amalgamation was the only way I could see of escaping and preserving my sanity. Of being allowed to grow up – and if it meant having to marry you to cement the deal – well,’ he grinned at her, ‘I could have lived with it, I suppose.’
‘You total shit!’ Nell bounced on the pearlised leather with no regard for the mess or the expense as the whisky slopped everywhere. ‘Why the hell didn’t you tell me before?’
‘How could I? I was under the impression that it was part of the deal. Oh, I knew you weren’t exactly panting to tear up the aisle in virgin white, but I couldn’t see any way out of it without alienating both lots of parents and screwing up my escape bid.’ He hugged her. ‘We’ll always be friends, though, won’t we? And now that you’ve told me all this, you’ll stay?’
‘Yes to the first, no to the second.’ Her cheek was pressed against his shirt. It might as well have been her father. It was comforting and familiar. Nothing more. ‘I’ve told your dad tonight what I’m doing. It nullifies the truck agreement and the gaffs, of course, as they were wedding presents.’
‘Well, thank God for that. Oh, not the trucks, I mean that’s a sod for you, but the fact that you’ve told him. Now they’ll blame you for the split. I’ll still be written into the Percival will.’
‘You really are a conniving, entrepreneurial, unprincipled bastard, aren’t you?’ She kissed his cheek. ‘So, will you talk to Danny and get him to buy the dodgems?’
‘Might as well.’ Ross wiped whisky from his fingers. ‘We’ve already put wheels in motion to buy the paratrooper and put the money into an account for Sam, wherever he is. I mean, he won’t come back. This isn’t quite how I’d envisaged the three-way partnership, but it’ll suit me. But what about you? What will you do?’
Nell wasn’t sure. Overwhelmed by relief, she was suddenly incredibly tired. There’d be money from the dodgems which would surely make some part-payment on the trucks. She was a Guild member herself. As long as Clem didn’t have her blackballed she’d be able to apply for her own sites, wouldn’t she? They might not be the prestige ones she’d planned, but they could start small – and grow …
‘I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me.’
‘I never did, sweetheart,’ Ross said, and kissed her.
Chapter Thirty
Claudia stretched and looked up from The World’s Fair. They hadn’t made the headlines – again. Nearly two weeks after their midnight dash, and there hadn’t been one whiff of scandal. At least, not in the papers. No doubt the fairgrounds were alive with nothing else.
She curled beneath Sam’s scarlet duvet, luxuriating that morning, as every other, in the long lie-ins, the breakfasts in bed, the cosseting. The living wagon, so overtly masculine with its red and dove grey colour scheme, had become her haven. She’d had time to lick her wounds, probe her scars, and delight in the gradual healing.
Not that it had been all gentle, she grinned to herself. Sam was too intelligent to think that she’d need kid-glove treatment for ever. She’d expected to feel waves of guilt about walking away from her marriage, but so far she hadn’t experienced the slightest twinge. Sam had told her that they would probably appear later, at irrational moments, when she was better able to handle them. He assured her that one’s body had built-in healing mechanisms. That as she grew stronger, she’d experience things that she’d be unable to cope with during her present vulnerability. It made sense; and even if it didn’t happen, the belief that it would, made each day a little easier.
Being with Sam was a revelation. She hadn’t realised that such relaxed happiness was possible. He seemed to enjoy spoiling her, and she certainly loved the attention. She knew he was weaning her away from the horrors very slowly. They’d teased each other and laughed a lot, and even had one row over a television programme. But it hadn’t been the flinching, cringing, battering-pulse-rate sort of row that she’d been used to. It had been quite grown-up really – it was a shame it had ended in a cushion fight …
And this, she thought, rolling out of bed in her pyjamas and peering out of the window, had been a stroke of genius. Sam’s genius, of course. She hadn’t even been thinking straight the night they’d left. Sam deciding to steer clear of travellers for a while, or at least until she’d regained her strength, had been brilliant.
After driving for most of the night they’d pulled the living wagon on to a tourist campsite in the Forest of Dean – having to pay two ground rents to accommodate its forty-foot length – and had lived like flatties on holiday. They were among touring caravans and frame tents, and apart from a few appreciative comments on the luxury of their accommodation, no one took any notice of them. It had been great. Joining in barbecues and drinking cheap beer every night in the humid clubhouse where sunburnt families laughed their socks off at rather blue comedians. Claudia had enjoyed every minute of it. But she knew that the time had now come to move on.
She wandered into the living room. Sam’s bedding was still strewn across the sofa and she folded the sheets, stowing them with the pillows in the seat lockers. She loved him – he loved her – but there was no pressure. She was sleeping well for the first time in years, alone, safe, and happy, knowing that he was only feet away from her.
They had talked about nothing but Danny that first night. They’d laid all the ghosts. There was nothing more to be said. No secrets left. They’d made a pact not to mention him again. They knew they would never go back, that their future was uncertain, and that there were still Adele and Peter to face. Sam had said there was plenty of time. They had also decided to keep their phones switched off for at least the first week. Claudia had ached to ring Nell, but felt that she couldn’t do it until she knew she wouldn’t cry the minute she heard Nell’s voice.
The time was nearly right, she thought, as she switched on the kettle, set out the mugs, and spooned in instant coffee, ready for Sam’s return. She was stronger, the nightmares were receding, and her belief in herself was re-emerging.
‘Put that muck back in the jar,’ Sam galloped up the living-wagon steps two at a time and waved a bottle of Moet beneath her nose. ‘We’re celebrating.’
‘We are?’ She kissed him. Tentatively, because she was still not quite used to it, and because she knew that he wanted her and she didn’t want to be unfair. ‘What exactly?’
‘This.’ Sam waved a piece of printed paper in front of her eyes, scrabbling in the cupboards for the crystal flutes at the same time. ‘I’ve been to the bank –’
Claudia knew. It was one of the problems. Not having any money. They’d used Sam’s credit card for foo
d and petrol. Claudia, whose card had been linked to Danny’s, had cut hers up and hurled it from the living-wagon window along with her wedding ring. Sam had been quite shocked about the ring – but she was absolutely sure that it was the final, irrevocable step. She considered herself no longer married to Danny. The ring that had bound them together now languished amidst burger wrappers and cigarette ends. It seemed fitting, somehow. It didn’t, of course, solve any financial problems.
Oh, there was definitely money owed to them from the paratrooper, but they wouldn’t touch that until they’d spoken to either Nell or Ross. They both had their own accounts with Bradleys, of course, but they wouldn’t last for ever, especially if they had to start from scratch. In fact, between them they’d probably got enough money for one medium-sized machine that went out of fashion last season and a couple of joints. Claudia felt guilty about Sam leaving the paratrooper behind. It had been his inheritance; his only form of income apart from the divvying-up of the annual profits. He’d left everything for her. It didn’t matter how many times he reassured her that it was what he wanted, she still experienced hot waves of shame.
Then there was the question of gaffs. They wouldn’t be able to join the usual circuit, and Claudia was adamant that she wouldn’t return to her northern family. They’d scoured the last two weeks’ World’s Fairs to see what opportunities were available. With rides, there were several – without, none at all. Unless, of course, they wanted to be gaff lads. They’d decided that this would be their final option, should all else fail.
Smiling, she watched him pouring the champagne. After years of practice, she wasn’t counting any chickens. Sam had made an appointment at the local branch of HSBC – the Bradleys’ bank – that morning. He had said he wouldn’t hold his breath. Neither had she. She’d experienced one miracle, to expect two would be just plain greedy.
‘So?’ She raised her glass to him. ‘I gather it went well?’
Stealing the Show Page 34
