by Jill Mansell
‘Don’t you trust me in the house, is that it? Worried I might make off with the family silver? It’s all right, you’re safe, I’m a law-abiding citizen these days. Can’t run fast enough to make it worthwhile.’ Red paused. ‘That was a joke, by the way. I never did break into people’s houses or nick stuff from anyone I knew.’
‘I know that.’ He’d been more of a smuggling-suitcases-filled-with-tobacco-through-Customs chancer. Rosa leaned against Shay for support and found the keys in her bag. ‘And of course I trust you. Come on, let’s get inside.’ As an afterthought, she added, ‘I don’t have anything worth taking anyway.’
The hand-painted mural, covering one entire wall of the living room, had been Julie’s pride and joy. Over a period of three weeks she had recreated a quirky, colourful version of Elliscombe, complete with houses, gardens, shops and inhabitants. Everyone she’d known had been featured and most were recognisable.
Red surveyed the mural with satisfaction. ‘There it is. As beautiful as ever. She was one talented lady.’
‘I’ve worked out now where you are.’ Rosa leaned against the table to give her knee a rest. ‘I didn’t know you and Julie had a fling. That’s you, isn’t it?’ She pointed to the painted version of Frog Cottage, with its pretty garden, tiny pond complete with leaping frogs, and the shadowy figure of a visitor emerging from what had once been Julie’s bedroom window and was now hers.
‘You didn’t know, because we were discreet. And yes, there I am, making a hasty exit because her dad was on his way over. See, there he is.’ Red pointed to the police car rounding the bend in the lane, with Julie’s father behind the wheel. ‘What with him being Old Bill, he wasn’t too keen on me.’
Shay said, ‘And who could blame him?’
Now that she knew who Julie’s escaping visitor had been, Rosa could see the deliberately vague hint of a likeness. She indicated a detached house in another section of the mural, over on the road leading to Bourton on the Water. ‘And look, you weren’t the only one up to no good; there’s someone else here, creeping out through the back garden gate . . . Oh!’ She started to laugh when she saw the expression on Red’s face.
‘Yes.’ He looked rueful. ‘That was me too. Julie’s way of letting me know she was aware of what I’d been getting up to while she was away.’
Rosa sent up a prayer of thanks that Julie was no longer around to portray the town’s ongoing secrets; imagine if she were to find herself immortalised in the mural, guiltily skulking in the furthest corner of the garden of Compton House.
With Shay’s assistance, she settled down in her red velvet armchair next to the fireplace. She carefully flexed her knee, then cleaned away the dried blood with warm water and tissues. The swelling wasn’t too bad and the pain was beginning to ease. With a bit of luck and a pressure bandage, she’d soon be on the mend.
‘Anyway, enough of my shady past.’ Red’s attention had been drawn to the items on the dining table over by the window. ‘What’s all this about? Sorry . . .’
When he’d stopped coughing, Rosa said, ‘If you don’t need to rush off, why don’t you sit down? I can make us a pot of tea.’
‘Hey, you two invalids stay where you are.’ Shay put out a hand to stop her before she could haul herself upright once more. ‘I can make the tea.’
He disappeared into the tiny kitchen. Red collected two of the dolls from the table and carried them over with him before taking the blue armchair opposite her. ‘Did you make these?’
‘I did. I do.’
‘And people buy them?’
She smiled. ‘That’s the general idea, what with having to earn a living and pay the bills.’
‘I was so sorry to hear about Joe. He was a great guy.’
Rosa nodded, glancing down at the wedding ring she hadn’t yet felt able to take off. The emptiness never lessened; she missed Joe as much as ever, but as time passed, she had grown more proficient at navigating the void. ‘He really was. I was so lucky.’
‘I haven’t heard what happened,’ Red’s tone was sympathetic, ‘but it can’t have been easy, having to move out of that big house.’
Compared with having to carry on living without the man she’d loved with all her heart, moving out of Compton House and into Frog Cottage hadn’t been hard at all. But the practically overnight reversal of fortune had obviously not been ideal. It wouldn’t be at the top of any newly bereaved widow’s wish list.
‘I’m getting used to it.’ Not feeling up to the full explanation, Rosa simply shrugged. ‘But yes, the reason I started the doll thing was to try and make some money. A friend of mine had a granddaughter with a port-wine birthmark on her face and neck, and she asked why none of her dolls looked like her, so I made one that did. And she loved it. That was what gave me the idea to set up a website so people could request dolls to be customised with the exact features they asked for.’
She pointed to the boy doll with spiky blonde hair and glasses, and an above-the-left-knee amputation. Wearing a stripy blue and white top with red shorts, he had freckles and a lopsided grin. ‘This one’s for a four-year-old called Robbie, who lives in New Zealand and lost his leg in an accident. And the other doll is for a little girl called Jade who lives in London. She has vitiligo, and her mum sent me a photo so I could get the patterns of de-pigmentation to exactly match the ones on her face and body.’
Red marvelled at the detail on the dolls. ‘They’re brilliant.’
‘It’s a lovely thing to be able to do. I often get sent photos of the children with their new dolls. And last week I was emailed a link to a video of a five-year-old being given the parcel with her doll inside. She had an arm and a foot amputated after a bout of meningitis. When she opened the parcel, she couldn’t stop hugging it and shouting, ‘My dolly’s just like me!’ She didn’t tell him she’d watched the video clip over and over again and had welled up every time.
When they’d drunk their tea, Shay said, ‘How’s the knee feeling now?’
Rosa flexed it this way and that. ‘Much better, thanks. Nothing broken.’ Although it was going to be a little while before she clambered over a high wall and jumped down into someone else’s garden.
‘Well that’s good. Dad, we need to head back to Birmingham or you’re going to miss your flight.’
Red nodded. He was looking weary now as he levered himself to his feet, but whilst his face might be thinner than it had once been, his smile was as disarming as ever. ‘Yes, we must go. It’s been wonderful to see you again, Rosa. And thanks so much for showing me the mural.’ His eyes glinted with mischief. ‘Happy memories of times past. Take care of yourself,’ he added, bending to plant a brief kiss on her cheek. ‘Mind that knee of yours and don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.’
It was almost as if he knew what she’d been up to. In addition, this was someone clearly very unwell, yet here he was urging her to look after her dodgy knee. Feeling like a complete fraud by comparison, Rosa said, ‘It’s lovely to see you again too.’
His father slept in the passenger seat all the way back to the airport on the outskirts of Birmingham. Having parked the car and woken him, Shay said, ‘So what do you think, now you’ve seen the house?’
‘Whose house? Rosa’s?’
‘Your house, the one you wanted to move into. The one that’s completely uninhabitable.’
‘But it’s the only place I want to be. We were happy there,’ said Red. ‘It’s where I want to spend however long I have left.’
Shay suppressed a sigh. He knew from experience that once his father set his mind to something, there’d be no changing it, regardless of whether the plan made an iota of sense.
‘OK, well I’ll speak to a few local builders and see what they have to say.’
‘I want you to do it.’
‘That’s not practical. I can’t do everything myself.’
‘But you can do some of it. And you can be there and project-manage the whole thing, oversee the rest of the work.’
; ‘I was going to take a holiday,’ Shay reminded him. ‘I was due a break, remember? After working non-stop for the last few years.’
‘I’m dying.’
‘Oh, so now we’re on to the emotional blackmail, are we?’
‘Now?’ A glimmer of a smile. ‘It’s been that way ever since I first thought of it.’
Of course it had. If imminent death didn’t allow you to play your trump card, what did?
‘Wouldn’t you rather stick with Angela in Edinburgh?’ Although Shay already knew the answer.
‘No. Every time she looks at me, she starts crying. I can’t spend the rest of my life comforting her because she’s upset about losing me.’ His father shook his head resignedly. ‘And I don’t want her coming down here either. Easier if we call it a day. All I want to do now is go home to Elliscombe, back to our place. And spend more time with my boy, to make up for all those months we missed out on.’
Months? Years more like. Shay said drily, ‘It’s not my fault you kept getting slung back in jail.’
‘And I know that only too well. Which is why I can’t make you agree to do this. It’s your choice, Shay. If you don’t want to do it, you don’t have to. You’re allowed to say no.’ He coughed gently. ‘God knows, it’s not as if I can force you.’
They both knew that. Just as Shay already knew there was no way in the world he could refuse.
Oh, the irony, though. Red had spent years of his life risking so much just to make a bit of money. And now that Shay had amassed so much more than his father had ever succeeded in making, it could be too late to grant Red’s final wish.
Once he’d accompanied his dad into the airport and left him at the departures gate, Shay headed back outside into the sunshine. A crimson Bentley Continental was now parked next to his car and a female chauffeur was lifting cases out of the boot whilst a couple in their seventies stood behind her clutching their passports and boarding passes.
‘Oh sorry, pet, we’re in your way, we’ll be gone in two seconds . . .’
‘It’s OK,’ Shay told the elderly woman as she flapped a hand apologetically. ‘Take your time, don’t worry.’
‘I can’t believe we came here in this beautiful car.’ Her eyes were bright as she confided, ‘It’s not ours, it’s a real Bentley! This lovely young lady collected us from our house in Solihull and drove us here . . . I kept waving at people in the street, like the Queen! And you’ll never guess where we’re going . . .’
‘Marjorie, you’re doing it again, love.’ Marjorie’s husband was shaking his head. ‘This young lad doesn’t want to know where we’re going; he just wants to jump into his car and get out of here.’
‘Oh sorry! I’m just excited,’ said Marjorie.
‘I can see that, and why wouldn’t you be?’ Shay was charmed by her enthusiasm. ‘I’d love to know where you’re off to.’
‘Well, it’s a present from our children for our golden wedding anniversary.’ She beamed with pride. ‘All my life I’ve wanted to go to Venice, but we could never afford it, what with the kids and everything, but now we’re going to stay there for a whole week! In a proper hotel! I keep pinching myself to make sure I’m not dreaming . . . We both do, don’t we, love?’
Her husband said, ‘You keep pinching me, I’ll tell you that much. You’re like a woman possessed.’
Shay said, ‘You’ll have an amazing time.’
Marjorie nodded happily. ‘Ooh, I know we will. Have you ever been to Venice, love?’
And that was it; in a flash he was back there in the Hotel Ciati, making fun of Didi’s off-key singing, followed by their serendipitous night-time encounter in a snowy St Mark’s Square, where they’d built a snowman together, shared a bottle of cheap Prosecco and experienced that first jolt of mutual attraction.
‘I have,’ he told her. ‘It’s a place you’ll never forget.’ In front of him Marjorie was nodding happily, but in his mind’s eye he was back there now, watching Didi twirl around with her arms outstretched and her head tipped back as she caught snowflakes on her tongue. Would she even remember doing that? Probably not. Whereas he had never forgotten it, just as he’d never forgotten the realisation that he’d never felt like this before, which meant there was a chance it could be the start of something—
The blonde chauffeur closed the now-empty boot of the Bentley with an expensive click, having already lined up her clients’ suitcases, ready to push them in tandem. ‘I’ll take these in for you and show you where you need to go. You’ll be on your way before you know it!’
‘Thank you, love, you’ve been so kind. Ooh, could we have our picture taken with you? Is that allowed?’
‘Let me do it,’ Shay offered as Marjorie produced her phone.
‘We’re going to take so many photos over the next week.’ She passed it over to him and clapped her pudgy hands together with delight. ‘Hundreds! Me and Bob want to remember every minute of this holiday for the rest of our lives!’
‘For the rest of our lives.’ Bob nodded in agreement. ‘Just got to hope the plane doesn’t crash.’
Chapter 7
After work on Friday evening, Didi showered and changed into a grey silk vest top and jeans. She brushed the tangles out of her wet hair, quickly redid her make-up and reached for her favourite scent. OK, no, not that one. Bracing herself slightly, she took the lid off the bottle of perfume Aaron had bought her for Christmas, then aimed the nozzle at her neck and wrists. It wasn’t the type of scent she went for, but Aaron had chosen it for her from an esoteric perfumier in Covent Garden because he’d liked it so much he’d known she would love it too. Then last weekend he’d commented on the fact that she wasn’t wearing it, and when she’d fibbed about having worn it all week, he’d looked at the almost-full bottle on the chest of drawers and said meaningfully, ‘It’s lasting you a long time, isn’t it?’
Because that was the annoying thing about perfumes you weren’t keen on; the tiniest spray seemed to lurk around forever.
Now she held the bottle out of the window and gave twenty or so energetic squirts that would hopefully dissipate into the fresh air outside rather than fly back into her bedroom. Her phone went ting and she glanced at the text from Aaron:
Can you pick me up? Arriving on time at 19.30 hrs. Missed you xx
She replied:
No problem, see you soon.
Then belatedly realised her mistake and sent a second one:
Sorry, thumb slipped, missed you too xx
It was only just gone seven, but she jumped into her car to make her way over to Moreton-in-Marsh. The train journey from Paddington took ninety minutes and Aaron always said the weekend couldn’t start until she’d met him at the station and greeted him with a kiss.
As she rounded the bend on the outskirts of Elliscombe, she saw up ahead the blue car parked on the overgrown driveway of Hillcrest. Instinctively she slowed, then felt her heart do a double thud at the sight of him coming around the side of the property speaking into his phone. He paused and looked at her.
To stop, or not to stop? That was the question.
Her foot hit the brake, making the decision for her.
‘Hi,’ said Shay as she climbed out of the driver’s seat.
‘You can carry on talking.’ Didi indicated the phone in his hand. ‘I just wondered how things are going.’
‘I wasn’t having a conversation, just making notes as to what needs doing. Which is pretty much everything.’
‘That bad?’
‘Want to see?’
She nodded and followed him into the house she hadn’t been inside for almost thirteen years. Back then, it hadn’t exactly been luxurious, but Shay and his dad had kept it clean and well furnished, if a little lacking, understandably enough, in the feminine touch. They might not have gone in for cushions and candles and colour-coordinated towels in the bathroom, but then again, nor had she ever encountered a dead rat in the living room like the one currently lying beside the fireplace with its legs in the air.
‘I know. Don’t look.’ Interrupting her horrified glance, Shay said, ‘This whole place is a health hazard.’
Didi followed him through to the kitchen. ‘It’s an everything hazard. Mind your head.’
The warning came in the nick of time; he ducked to avoid the thick cobweb festooned between the door and the wall and she saw him shudder. Nothing else – not snakes, rodents nor any other kind of insect – had ever bothered Shay, but spiders were his absolute nemesis; they’d always freaked him out.
And it looked as if they still did. To divert his attention from the one lurking ninja-style on the wall next to the cobweb, Didi said, ‘So what are you going to do?’
‘Well, as you know, the plan was to show my dad some great little properties in the area that are good to go so he can move straight in.’ Shay wagged a finger. ‘But no, that would be far too simple. He still has his heart set on this place.’
‘The Harris brothers are good; we use them when we need work done.’
‘He wants me to oversee the project myself. Move down here and stay with it from start to finish.’
‘Oh.’ Bit of an adrenalin rush.
‘I know. Not how I’d planned to spend the summer.’
‘Could you tell him you can’t do it but someone else can?’
‘Apparently not. He played the dying card, big time.’
‘I’m sorry.’ The air of flippancy was something of a front, Didi knew. Inwardly, she was equally conflicted. Seeing Shay again was stirring up all kinds of emotions, ones she’d put to bed over a decade ago.
‘Sorry about what?’
‘Your dad being so ill. I can’t imagine what it must be like for you.’ There’d only been the two of them, father and son. It was nineteen years since his mother had died. When Red went too, Shay would have no family left.
‘These things happen.’ He shrugged, pointed to the staircase. ‘It’s all pretty grim up there. You don’t need to see it.’
Didi shook her head, relieved to be spared that awkwardness. He had to be as aware as she was that his old bedroom upstairs was where they’d spent so much time during those idyllic months together. It was where, six weeks after that first night in the snow in St Mark’s Square, she’d lost her virginity to Shay Mason. He’d been her first love and she’d been his.
