‘I know. It’s nice to dream, though, wonder what it would be like to be a little adventurous.’
Hector laughs. ‘There’s adventurous and there’s downright impractical.’
My turn to laugh. ‘That’s rich, coming from somebody who hankers after some old half-timbered wreck.’
Hector throws up his chin, feigning offence. But my mind is already careering into wild, uncharted territory where leaving our house and setting up somewhere else – not Cornwall, but not Oakheart either, or anywhere near – holds an undeniable appeal. I realise that it’s only because we’re nearing home-time that my thoughts are veering towards desperate. And in any case, we’d hardly be out of the line of fire in time, would we? Tessa may be languishing on the Italian coast, but somehow it no longer feels like a safe distance. It feels like no distance at all. I let out a big sigh.
Hector’s eyes instantly swivel to mine, his loving concern an irritation today rather than something joyful. I turn the sigh into a yawn, stretching my swim-tired arms above my head, and suggest we eat in a restaurant tonight for a treat, one of those special fishy places. Hector says he was about to suggest the same himself.
‘We won’t even look at the menu prices before we go in.’ He winks at me.
I sit back and relax, deciding that nothing is going to spoil the evening. But something does. Or rather, someone.
The text arrives on my phone as I take it with me to the bathroom before we go out.
Have you told him yet? I’m waiting, remember.
Just those few words, and her initials, TG. Like I didn’t know who it was from.
I don’t reply. Did she honestly think I would?
And here I sit with my precious family, in the best fish restaurant in our part of Cornwall, while I try to eat and pretend I’m having a good time and that nothing is wrong.
Nothing at all.
Twenty-Seven
FRAN
Monday morning. We came back from Cornwall on Saturday, and since then my mind has dwelt, not on Tessa and her ultimatum, as you would expect, but on Maria Capelli. And I suppose it isn’t surprising that I’m drawn to High Heaven, despite its dubious connotations.
The magnetic tug of the place has me on my feet and ready to leave the house by nine-thirty, safe in the knowledge that the girls are taken care of. Kitty, to her credit – and our surprise – has found herself a holiday job at The Pot and Kettle; Hazel is at a friend’s house in Oakheart, along with a group of other girls including Zoe’s friend Tayler, whom she apparently now likes – we all raise our eyes at this news; and Caitlin has gone with Hector to work. We’re all linked by mobile phones, and for a few hours at least, I am free.
I have the week off from the surgery and plan to use the time to solve my dilemma. There has to be a solution; I won’t be beaten by this. First, I need to clear my head and do a little thinking, on my own, without Hector present to screw up any logic I still possess.
The grass at High Heaven is crisp and fawn-coloured in places from lack of rain. The meadow where the sheep graze and the fields below are turning from emerald to olive for the same reason. The sun today is accompanied by a stiff, drying breeze, brisker up here than down below. It whips the ends of my hair across my face, and I find an elasticated band in the pocket of my jeans and gather it into a ponytail.
Despite the early hour, I’m not the only visitor to High Heaven. A dog-walker’s van was in the car park, and two young women wearing cropped combats are walking away from the crest of the hill, following the dip of the escarpment, with three dogs apiece on leads. A grey-haired man and woman in sturdy footwear take youthful strides in the opposite direction, and a young man with sunglasses on his head sits cross-legged in the grass, sketching the view on a large, white-paper drawing block.
I sit down on the bench. It’s set between bushes, which act as a windbreak. The wash of warmth on my face brings a welcome feeling of wellbeing, and for a while I let my mind drift back to Cornwall, imagining I’m back in the old deckchair in the cottage garden, the girls happily occupied, Hector half-asleep next to me. A bird wheels overhead, cutting easily across the blue-and-white sky, the motion bringing me back to the present. I need to stay focussed, and not let my mind drift.
So, Maria. It doesn’t seem morbid that I’ve come to the place where she spent her last living moments – I can’t say the other word inside my head, not right now. The more I’ve thought about the story Grace told me, the more believable it has become. Maria is inextricably linked to Ben, and therefore to Tessa, and now, by circumstances beyond my control, to me.
Did she sit on this bench in silent contemplation before she… did what she did? Was there a period of doubt, when things could have gone either way? I shudder involuntarily. She must have had other reasons, other than her liaison, if it existed, with Ben, however badly wrong it went. Whatever tortures she suffered, whether they were anything to do with Ben or not, how could she have deprived that little boy of his mother in the most devastating way possible? It’s beyond my comprehension.
But I have no way of knowing what went on in Maria’s mind, what sadness she endured, or the extent of her psychological problems, any more than I could know how Ben was thinking and acting at the time. He told me he hadn’t had any other lovers, and I believed him, probably because it suited me to. He’s certainly not behaving well now, with his obvious remarks and his invitation to coffee. Ben has broken the unspoken contract between us, perhaps in more ways than I realise. It is with a dash of depression and regret that I conclude I didn’t know Ben as well as I thought I did. In fact, I hardly knew him at all.
This is getting me nowhere. I feel no more connected to Maria in this tragic place than anywhere else, nor any closer to the truth about her death. If by some mystical trickery, her final scene was to play itself out in front of me, right now, I would still be no nearer to knowing what to do about Tessa’s ultimatum. No nearer to stopping this awful threat to my husband and our marriage than on the day she delivered it.
I get up from the bench and cross the turf to stand on the slight incline that leads upwards to the precipice. I try not to think about the drop itself, and what has occurred there, nor do I think about the times when I came to High Heaven to meet Ben. Instead, I run through the script, the one where I say to Hector, ‘I’ve got something important to tell you, and I’d like you not to say anything until I’ve finished.’ That is how it begins, in my head. How it continues, or ends, I haven’t the foggiest idea.
I’m aware of somebody approaching, and I glance round. A woman is walking up from the car park. As she reaches the top, she stops and looks around. She seems tentative, as if she might have come to the wrong place. She’s small, about five-foot four, slim, but with a rounded softness to her figure. Her short-cut hair is black, sprinkled with silver, and although her complexion is pale, her face speaks of a Mediterranean heritage. She’s wearing a plain grey shift dress, and carrying a bouquet of flowers.
Aware that I’m staring, I tear my gaze back to the landscape. But when I glance round again, I realise she hasn’t noticed. She doesn’t look at me, nor at the artist who is hurrying his pencil along as if his time is running out. The woman starts towards the edge, and I’m thinking I should warn her about the drop. Then she stops, looks round again, and treads over the bumpy turf to the bench. Next to the bench, the grass grows long among the trunks of the gorse and other shrubs. At some time, a bush has been sheared off a foot above the ground, either by a storm or the hatchet of a long-ago council worker.
The woman looks round once more, then stoops and places the bouquet so that it leans against the stump, then takes a few steps backwards and stands with head bowed, looking at the flowers.
The artist unfolds long limbs, stands up and walks away towards the car park, his art equipment in a rough bundle under his arm. No-one else is here now, just me and the woman. I’m about to head off myself, let her have her private time alone, when she turns and gives me a half-smile.
So, I walk across, slowly, giving her time to leave if she wants to. Instead, she waits.
‘Hello.’ I smile as I reach her, nodding towards the flowers. ‘They’re beautiful. I hope the wind doesn’t spoil them. It can get wild up here, when the wind’s up.’
She shrugs. ‘It is no matter. I have brought them for her, that’s the important thing.’
‘For…?’ I wouldn’t ask, only I sense she wants to tell me.
‘My little sister. It’s her birthday. She would have been forty-five today.’
The bouquet contains flame-orange roses, deep red antirrhinums, pink carnations, and lime green miniature chrysanthemums. Bold, vibrant, clashing.
‘They’re very colourful,’ I say.
‘I chose them for the colours. They’re just like her. She was bright, too, and she had a fiery temperament.’ She gives a little laugh. ‘It got her into trouble, a number of times.’
The question is on my lips; I daren’t let it out. The woman must have sensed it from my silence.
‘You are wondering,’ she says, with a small smile. ‘You are wondering what happened to her.’
‘Well…’
‘It is okay. I would be curious, too. You see the tributes all the time, the bunches of flowers, mainly at the side of the road, the places where the bad thing happened. You don’t usually see the person who left them.’
‘That’s true,’ I say. There’s something about this woman that draws me in, makes me stay when I should be walking away. Beneath the sadness that melts her dark eyes is a quiet fortitude that reminds me of my own shortcomings. I indicate the bench. ‘Do you want to talk about your sister? Please say if you don’t and I’ll scuttle off right now and leave you in peace.’
She smiles in reply, sits down on the bench and pats the space next to her. ‘My name is Giada.’
‘Fran. Francesca, really.’
Giada inclines her head and looks at me. ‘You are not Italian?’
‘Ah, no. My mother just liked the name.’
Giada nods, and rests her hands loosely in her lap. ‘It is a while ago now, since it happened. Three years come October. They said she took her own life, jumped to her death, from this place. High Heaven, it is known as, right?’
‘Yes, that’s what we call it. You aren’t from around here, then?’
‘No, I drove from Brighton, early. I went first to where she lived, just to look, you know? There have been two birthdays since she died. I took flowers to her grave, both times. But today…’ She shrugs. ‘I don’t know. I think I should be brave and come and see this place for myself. I haven’t before. I think I must walk in her footsteps, here… not over there.’ She points towards the grassy rise, beyond which is the unfathomable drop. ‘There, I just imagine.’
‘I’m so sorry,’ I say, feeling worse than useless. ‘It’s not an image you want in your head.’
Giada smiles, but her eyes are clear, her chin determined. ‘It is fine. I am tough. There is no other way to be, is there?’
I don’t reply. I let Giada talk, and as she talks about her sister, a picture is forming in my mind, outlines at first, pencil marks, like the artist made on his pad, and gradually the lines strengthen and the colours wash in, the shapes fitting snugly against one another, explaining the spaces, making sense.
And I know why I have come here today.
‘My sister fell in love. He was married, and she thought he would leave his wife for her. What she did was against her beliefs, against everything she stood for, but she couldn’t help herself. She worked for him, in the family house. She had no man in her life, but she had a child of her own, a beautiful little boy, Luca. He lives with me and my family now. We take care of him.’
My eyelids are hot with gathering tears. One escapes. Giada sees before I have the chance to wipe it away.
‘I have made you sad,’ she says.
‘Yes, but not as sad as you.’
Giada straightens her shoulders, stares straight ahead. ‘This is why I do not believe, you see. Because she had Luca.’
‘Believe what, Giada?’
‘That my sister took her own life. She was desperate for this man. He captured her heart, and he broke it. When he and his family moved here, to Oakheart, she moved, too. I did not realise at first that she was following him. She said she liked the village and it was time she made a home for her and Luca. I agreed. I missed her, but she needed her independence, and I thought it would be good for both of them.’
‘That’s a pretty drastic step, moving house to be near him.’
Giada nods ruefully. ‘She said he was the love of her life, but she was never happy. How could she be when he belonged to somebody else? He made her promises, promises he had no intention of keeping. That is the impression I had. She did not tell me his name, or anything about him. But I knew she could see nothing but him. Except for Luca. Her son was always in her mind, in her heart.’ Giada turns back to me. ‘But there, that is what they say. That she must have jumped, from the edge. I tell them she was unhappy in love but still she would not do such a thing. I tell them over and over. But there was nobody to say anything else. It is different now, there does not have to be complete proof, only that suicide was probable. I do not blame the court for labelling her death that way, but it does not help.’
I let a silence fall between us before I ask the question, even though I already know the answer.
‘What was her name, your sister?’
‘Her name was Maria.’
Giada leaves before me; she has to drive back to Brighton to be home for her family, which I now know includes Maria Capelli’s son, Luca. Before she goes, we share a hug, and she thanks me for letting her talk about her sister. As the sound of her car dies away, I sit on the bench, watching the vivid petals of the bouquet fluttering in the breeze, and feel like an absolute fraud. Giada opened her heart to me, and I didn’t admit that I knew of the tragedy, and that Maria was constantly on my mind. How could I? But if Giada took some comfort from having a willing listener, my visit to High Heaven has been fruitful, just not in the way I had planned.
As I trudge down the path to the cindered car park, I start to imagine the circumstances of Maria’s death in a way I have not dared to imagine before. Did Tessa deal with her in the same way she dealt with me? Did she issue the same kind of ultimatum, which drove the poor woman to despair? But Maria didn’t have a husband or partner, so how would that have worked? Perhaps Tessa threatened to tell Giada and bring shame on the family, or to spread the gossip among people in the community where they lived at the time. The church may have been a factor: Giada implied that Maria had beliefs, which I took to be religious.
It wouldn’t have been the same, though, without a husband involved. The impact of the ultimatum would surely not have been enough to force Maria into committing suicide, especially as she was a mother, as Giada said.
My thoughts wind on inconclusively. Was Maria clinically depressed? Was it her mental state which sent her on that fateful mission to High Heaven, the hopeless situation with Ben a contributory factor to her tragic end, but not the actual cause of it?
I can’t get my head around this at all. By the time I’ve bumped the car down the lane and reached the hamlet of Lower Hovington, my grief for Maria has started up afresh, and I’m grieving for myself, too, for the dreadful mess I’ve made of everything. I may never know the truth about Maria, and I will always be sad for her. But I do have my life, and it is up to me to take control of it.
Twenty-Eight
FRAN
Three days later, around eleven in the morning, I ring the doorbell at Rose Cottage, having dropped Caitlin off at Maisie’s, as arranged. For the first time, I have reason to be thankful for the friendship between Hazel and Zoe, providing me with the information that the Grammaticus family returned home from holiday yesterday. I also know that Hazel texted Zoe this morning, suggesting they meet up today, and received by return a selfie of her on the train, on the way to London with he
r mother to do some shopping.
What I do not know is whether Ben has the rest of the week off. I could be about to find out.
Having resolved to make some decisions this week and to return to work on Monday lighter and happier and ready to face the world again – a tad overoptimistic, but still – I have failed spectacularly on that front, and now I am acting more or less on impulse. Apart from Tessa, Ben is the last person I’ve wanted to set eyes on. But I can’t just sit and think; my thoughts rotate like a hula-hoop, getting me nowhere except back where I started. Time is running out; I need to do something, even if that something turns out to be disastrous. I reason – if reason comes into it – that I can’t be any worse off than I already am.
Even as my finger leaves the bell, I’ve convinced myself that Ben is not home, and I’m backing away, ready to fly down the path, having narrowly missed making a huge mistake – another one. But no, here he is, opening the door as fast as if he’s been waiting behind it, and I am bathed in the familiar expression of pleasure and surprise as surely as if somebody turned a spotlight on me.
My stupid heart responds with a little jump, and an electrical tingle reaches the base of my spine. The feeling lasts only for as long as it takes me to snap it off and discard it, like a dead twig.
‘Fran! Come in!’ Ben holds the door wide for me to enter.
‘No, thank you.’ If I never set foot in Rose Cottage again, it will be too soon. ‘I just came to ask if we could talk. Not now, not here, just…’
Ben’s smile doesn’t falter. He’s got this all wrong, I can see that. Ben has trouble with reading people’s faces and body language, I’ve noticed that. This will take careful handling.
He takes a step forward onto the doorstep, causing me to take a step back. ‘What’s wrong with now? I’m on my own, I’ve got all day. Come in, Fran.’ He makes it sound like an order, but then he always did.
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