Cecelia Ahern 2-book Bundle

by Cecelia Ahern

  I leave the quiet rooms behind me and enter the gallery of the main hall. Below me I can see Dad wandering around the crowded hall with the bin in his hands. I smile as I watch him.

  ‘Have we ever been to Banqueting House together?’

  ‘Refresh my memory, where is it, what is it and what does it look like?’

  ‘It’s at the Trafalgar Square end of Whitehall. It’s a seventeenth-century former royal palace designed by Inigo Jones in 1619. Charles I was executed on a scaffold in front of the building. I’m in a room now, with nine canvases covering the panelled ceiling.’ What does it look like? I close my eyes. ‘From memory, the roofline is balustrade. The street façade has two orders of engaged columns, Corinthian over Ionic, above a rusticated basement, which lock together in a harmonious whole.’

  ‘Joyce?’

  ‘Yes?’ I snap out of it.

  ‘Are you reading from a tourist guide?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Our last trip to London consisted of Madame Tussaud’s, a night in G-A-Y and a party back in a man named Gloria’s flat. It’s happening again, isn’t it? That thing you were talking about?’

  ‘Yes.’ I slump into a chair in the corner, feel a rope beneath me and jump back up. I quickly move away from the antique chair, looking around for security cameras.

  ‘Has your being in London got anything to do with the American man?’

  ‘Yes,’ I whisper.

  ‘Oh, Joyce—’

  ‘No, Frankie, listen. Listen and you’ll understand. I hope. Yesterday I panicked about something and called Dad’s doctor, a number that is practically engraved in my head, as it should be. I couldn’t possibly get it wrong, right?’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Wrong. I ended up dialling a UK number and a girl named Bea answered the phone. She’d seen an Irish number and thought it was her dad calling. So from our short conversation I figure out that her dad is American but was in Dublin and was travelling to London last night to see her in a show today. And she has blonde hair. I think Bea is the little girl I keep dreaming about seeing on the swings and playing in the sand, all at different ages.’

  Frankie is quiet.

  ‘I know I sound insane, Frankie, but this is what’s happening. I have no explanation for it.’

  ‘I know, I know,’ she says quickly. ‘I’ve known you practi c ally all my life – this is not something you’d be inclined to make up – but even as I take you seriously please do keep in consideration the fact that you’ve had a traumatic time and what you’re currently experiencing could be due to high levels of stress.’

  ‘I’ve already considered that.’ I groan and hold my head in my hands. ‘I need help.’

  ‘We’ll only consider insanity as a last resort. Let me think for a second.’ She sounds as though she’s writing it down. ‘So basically, you have seen this girl, Bea—’

  ‘Maybe Bea.’

  ‘OK, OK, let’s just say it is Bea. You’ve seen her grow up?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘To what age?’

  ‘From birth to I don’t know …’

  ‘Teenager, twenties, thirties?’

  ‘Teenager.’

  ‘OK, so who else is in the scenes with Bea?’

  ‘Another woman. With a camera.’

  ‘But never your American man?’

  ‘No. So he probably has nothing to do with this at all.’

  ‘Let’s not rule anything out. So when you view Bea and the lady with the camera, are you part of the scene or viewing them as an outsider?’

  I close my eyes and think hard, see my hands pushing the swing, holding hands, taking a photograph of the girl and her mother in the park, feeling the water from the sprinklers spray and tickle my skin … ‘No, I’m part of it. They can see me.’

  ‘OK.’ She is silent.

  ‘What, Frankie, what?’

  ‘I’m figuring it out. Hold on. OK. So you see a child, a mother and they both see you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Would you say that in your dreams you’re viewing this girl grow up through the eyes of a father?’

  Goose bumps form on my skin.

  ‘Oh my God,’ I whisper. The American man?

  ‘I take it that’s a yes,’ Frankie says. ‘OK, we’re on to something here. I don’t know what, but it’s something very weird and I can’t believe I’m even entertaining these thoughts. But what the hell, I only have a million other things to do. What else do you dream about?’

  ‘It’s all very fast, images just flashing by.’

  ‘Try and remember.’

  ‘Sprinklers in a garden. A chubby young boy. A woman with long red hair. I hear bells. See old buildings with shop fronts. A church. A beach. I’m at a funeral. Then at college. Then with the woman and young girl. Sometimes she’s smiling and holding my hand, sometimes she’s shouting and slamming doors.’

  ‘Hmm … she must be your wife.’

  I bury my head in my hands. ‘Frankie, this sounds so ridiculous.’

  ‘Who cares? When has life ever made sense? Let’s keep going.’

  ‘I don’t know, the images are all so abstract. I can’t make any sense of it.’

  ‘What you should do is, every time you get a flash of something, or suddenly know something you never knew, then write it down and tell me. I’ll help you figure this out.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘So apart from the place you’re in now, what kinds of things do you suddenly just know about?’

  ‘Em … mostly buildings.’ I look around and then up at the ceiling. ‘And art. I spoke Italian to a man at the airport. And Latin, I spoke Latin to Conor the other day.’

  ‘Oh God.’

  ‘I know. I think he wants to have me sent away.’

  ‘Well, we won’t let him do that. Yet. OK so, buildings, art, languages. Wow, Joyce, it’s like you’ve gotten a crash course in an entire college education you never had. Where is the culturally ignorant girl I once knew and loved?’

  I smile. ‘She’s still here.’

  ‘OK, one more thing. My boss has called me for a meeting this afternoon. What is it about?’

  ‘Frankie, I don’t have psychic powers!’

  The door to the gallery opens and a flustered-looking young girl with a headset over her head rushes in. She approaches almost every woman on her way in, asking for me.

  ‘Joyce Conway?’ she asks me, out of breath.

  ‘Yes.’ My heat beats a mile a minute. Please let Dad be OK. Please, God.

  ‘Is your father Henry?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘He wants you to join him in the green room.’

  ‘He what? In the what?’

  ‘He’s in the green room. He’s going live with Michael Aspel in just a few minutes with his item and he wants you to join him because he says you know more about it. We really have to move now, there’s very little time and we need to get you made up.’

  ‘Live with Michael Aspel …’ I trail off. I realise I’m still holding the phone. ‘Frankie,’ I say, dazed, ‘put on BBC, quick. You’re about to witness me getting into very big trouble.’

  

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  I half-walk, half-run behind the girl with the headset, to get to the green room, and arrive panting and nervous to see Dad sitting on a make-up chair facing a mirror lit up by bulbs, tissue tucked into his collar, a cup and saucer in his hand, his bulbous nose being powdered for his close-up.

  ‘Ah, there you are, love,’ Dad says grandly. ‘Everybody, this is my daughter and she’ll be the one to tell us all about my lovely piece here that caught the eye of Michael Aspel.’ This is followed by a chuckle and he sips on his tea. ‘There’s Jaffa Cakes over there if you want them.’

  Evil little man.

  I look around the room at all the interested, nodding heads, and force a smile onto my face.

  Justin squirms uncomfortably in his chair in the dentist’s waiting room, with his throbbing swollen cheek
, sandwiched between two old dears carrying on a conversation about someone they know called Rebecca, who should leave a man called Timothy.

  Shut up, shut up, shut up!

  The 1970s television in the corner, which is covered by a lace cloth and fake flowers, announces that the Antiques Roadshow is about to begin.

  Justin groans. ‘Does anybody mind if I change the channel?’

  ‘I’m watching it,’ says a young boy no older than seven years old.

  ‘Charming,’ Justin smiles at him with loathing, then looks to his mother for backup.

  Instead she shrugs. ‘He’s watching it.’

  Justin grunts in frustration.

  ‘Excuse me.’ Justin finally interrupts the women to his right and left. ‘Would one of you ladies like to swap places with me, so that you can continue this conversation more privately?’

  ‘No, don’t worry, love, there’s nothing private about this conversation, believe you me. Eavesdrop all you like.’

  The smell of her breath silently tiptoes under his nostrils again, tickles them with a feather duster and runs off with an evil giggle.

  ‘I wasn’t eavesdropping. Your lips were quite literally in my ear, and I’m not sure if Charlie or Graham or Rebecca would appreciate that.’ He turns his nose away.

  ‘Oh, Ethel,’ one laughs, ‘he thinks we’re talking about real people.’

  How foolish I am.

  Justin turns his attention back to the television in the corner, which the other six people in the room are glued to.

  ‘… And welcome to our first live Antiques Roadshow special …’

  Justin sighs loudly again.

  The little boy narrows his eyes at him and raises the volume with the remote control that is firmly within his grasp.

  ‘… coming to you from Banqueting House, London.’

  Oh, I’ve been there. A nice example of Corinthian and Ionic locked together in a harmonious whole.

  ‘We have had over two thousand people spilling through our doors since nine thirty this morning, and only moments ago those doors have closed, leaving us to display the best pieces for you to view at home. Our first guests come from—’

  Ethel leans across Justin and rests her elbow on his thigh. ‘So anyway, Margaret—’

  He zones in on the television so as not to grab both their heads and smash them together.

  ‘So what do we have here?’ Michael Aspel asks. ‘Looks like a designer waste basket to me,’ he says as the camera takes a close-up on the piece propped on the table.

  Justin’s heart begins to palpitate.

  ‘Do you want me to change it now, mister?’ The boy flicks through the channels at top speed.

  ‘No!’ he shouts, breaking through Margaret and Ethel’s conversation and reaching out dramatically into thin air as though he can stop the waves from changing the channel. He falls to the carpet on his knees, before the television. Margaret and Ethel jump and go silent. ‘Go back, go back, go back!’ he shouts at the boy.

  The boy’s lower lip begins to tremble as he looks to his mother.

  ‘There’s no need to shout at him.’ She holds his head to her chest, protectively.

  He grabs the remote control from the boy and flicks through the channels at top speed. He stops when he comes upon the close-up of Joyce, whose eyes are looking uncertainly to the left and right, as though she has just landed in the cage of a Bengal tiger at feeding time.

  In the Irish Financial Services Centre, Frankie is racing through the offices searching for a television. She finds one, surrounded by dozens of suits studying the figures that are racing by on the screen.

  ‘Excuse me! Coming through!’ she shouts, pushing her way through. She rushes to the TV and starts fiddling with the buttons to cries of abuse from the men and women around her.

  ‘I’ll just be one minute, the market won’t crash in all of the two minutes this will take.’ She flicks around and finds Joyce and Henry live on BBC.

  She gasps and holds her hands up to her mouth. And then she laughs and throws her fist at the screen. ‘You go, Joyce!’

  The team around her quickly shuffles off to find another screen, apart from one man who seems pleased by the change in channel and decides to stay and watch.

  ‘Oh, that’s a nice piece,’ he comments, leaning back against the desk and folding his arms.

  ‘Em …’ Joyce is saying, ‘well, we found it … I mean we put it, put this beautiful … extraordinarily … eh, wooden … bucket, outside of our house. Well, not outside,’ she quickly withdraws that statement on seeing the appraiser’s reaction. ‘Inside. We put it inside our front porch so that it’s protected from the weather, you see. For umbrellas.’

  ‘Yes, and it may have been used for that too,’ he says. ‘Where did you get it from?’

  Joyce’s mouth opens and closes for a few seconds and Henry jumps in. He is standing upright with his hands clasped over his belly. His chin is raised, there is a glint in his eye and he ignores the expert and takes on a posh accent to direct his answer at Michael Aspel, whom he addresses as though he’s the Pope.

  ‘Well, Michael, I was given this by my great-great-grandfather Joseph Conway, who was a farmer in Tipperary. He gave it to my grandfather Shay, who was also a farmer. My grandfather gave it to my father, Paddy-Joe, who was also a farmer in Cavan and then when he died, I took it.’

  ‘I see, and do you have any idea where your great-great-grandfather may have got this?’

  ‘He probably stole it from the Brits,’ Henry jokes, and is the only one to laugh. Joyce elbows her father, Frankie snorts, and on the floor before the television in a dentist’s waiting room in London, Justin throws his head back and laughs loudly.

  ‘Well, the reason I ask is because this is a fabulous item you have. It’s a rare nineteenth-century English Victorian era upright jardinière planter—’

  ‘I love gardening, Michael,’ Henry interrupts the expert, ‘do you?’

  Michael smiles at him politely and the expert continues, ‘It has wonderful hand-carved Black Forest-style plaques set in the Victorian ebonised wood framing on all four sides.’

  ‘Country English or French décor, what do you think?’ Frankie’s work colleague asks her.

  She ignores him, concentrating on Joyce.

  ‘Inside it has what looks like an original tole-painted tin liner. Superb condition, ornate patterns carved into the solid wood panels. We can see here that two of the sides have a floral motif and the other two sides are figural, one with the centre lion’s head and the other with griffin figures. Very striking indeed and an absolutely wonderful piece to have by your front door too.’

  ‘Worth a few quid, is it?’ Henry asks, dropping the posh accent.

  ‘We’ll get to that part,’ the expert says. ‘While it is in good condition, it appears there would have been feet, quite likely wooden. There are no splits or warping in the sides, there is an original tole-painted tin removable liner and the finger ring handles on the sides are intact. So bearing all that in mind, how much do you think it’s worth?’

  ‘Frankie!’ Frankie hears her boss calling her from across the room. ‘What’s this I hear about you messing with the monitors?’

  Frankie stands up, turns her back and while blocking the television with her body, attempts to turn the channel back.

  ‘Ah,’ her colleague tuts. ‘They were just about to announce the value. That’s the best bit.’

  ‘Step aside,’ her boss frowns.

  Frankie moves to display the stock market figures racing across the screen. She smiles brightly, showing all her teeth, and then sprints back to her desk.

  In the dental surgery’s waiting room, Justin is glued to the television, glued to Joyce’s face.

  ‘Is she a friend, love?’ Ethel asks.

  Justin studies Joyce’s face and smiles, ‘Yes she is. Her name is Joyce.’

  Margaret and Ethel ooh and aah.

  On screen, Joyce’s father or at least who Justin as
sumes him to be, turns to Joyce and shrugs.

  ‘What would you say, love? How much lolly for Dolly?’

  Joyce smiles tightly. ‘I really wouldn’t have the slightest idea how much it’s worth.’

  ‘How does between one thousand five hundred to one thousand seven hundred pounds sound to you?’ the expert asks.

  ‘Sterling pounds?’ the old man asks, flabbergasted.

  Justin laughs.

  The camera zooms in on Joyce and her father’s face. They are both astonished, so gobsmacked, in fact, that neither of them can say anything.

  ‘Now there’s an impressive reaction,’ Michael laughs. ‘Good news from this table, let’s go over to our porcelain table to see if any of our other collectors here in London, have been as lucky.’

  ‘Justin Hitchcock,’ the receptionist announces.

  The room is quiet. They all look around at one another.

  ‘Justin,’ she repeats, raising her voice.

  ‘That must be him on the floor,’ Ethel says. ‘Yoohoo!’ she sings and gives him a kick with her comfortable shoe. ‘Are you Justin?’

  ‘Somebody’s in love, ooohey-ooohey,’ Margaret sings while Ethel makes kissing noises.

  ‘Louise,’ Ethel says to the receptionist, ‘why don’t I go in now while this young man runs down to Banqueting House to see his lady? I’m tired of waiting.’ She stretches her left leg out and makes pained expressions.

  Justin stands and wipes the carpet hairs from his trousers. ‘I don’t know why you’re both waiting here anyway, at your age. You should just leave your teeth here and then come back later when the dentist’s finished with them.’

  He exits the room as a year-old copy of Homes and Gardens flies at his head.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  ‘Actually, that’s not a bad idea.’ Justin stops following the receptionist down the hallway to the surgery, as adrenalin once again surges through his body. ‘That’s exactly what I’ll do.’

  ‘You’re going to leave your teeth here?’ she says drily, in a strong Liverpool accent.

  ‘No, I’m going to Banqueting House,’ he says, hopping about with excitement.