‘Somewhere to rent would be the best thing,’ he said thoughtfully, ‘or rent-free, if such a thing exists.’ He was thinking that he knew just the place, but it would depend on a couple of things How soon the house was ready for occupation and if Sallie wanted to move into it with him. If by some miracle she did, Melanie and Rick could have the apartment rent-free. He and Sallie owned it, so there would be no problem there.
They were both in high spirits for the rest of the evening, but beneath the lightheartedness Sallie was wondering just how much Steve really had accepted their childlessness. It had been upsetting enough during those fraught months after his operation when no pregnancy had been forthcoming, but he’d made it ten times worse by creating a three-year break in their lives.
Something had changed, though, in recent weeks. He might be wary of putting a foot wrong, but she sensed some sort of purpose in him. A kind of controlled excitement. Sometimes in the evenings he went out for short periods without explaining where he’d been, and there was no way she was going to ask. She knew that he visited Philip regularly, but didn’t think it was to the Gresty farm that he went on those occasions.
The next morning, Steve went to visit Philip and found him lying on the sofa in the sitting room. Philip tried to raise himself to a sitting position when he saw Steve but had had to give up.
‘How are you today?’ he’d asked.
‘Not good,’ Philip said. ‘Some days are worse than others.’
Steve nodded. ‘So let’s have a look at you to see what’s been happening since I was here last. But before I do that, have you spoken to Janine about the genetic side of your illness?’
‘Yes,’ he said sombrely. ‘She’s out giving a riding lesson at the moment, but is due back any time and wants a word with you.’
‘How did she react when she knew that your uncle had the illness?’
Philip gave a grim smile. ‘She’d already worked it out for herself. My daughter is no fool. She’d read motor neurone disease up in various medical books and knew the score.’
‘So what about her being tested to see if she has the rogue gene?’
‘That’s what she wants to talk to you about. We know what she’s decided, but she wants to tell you herself.’
At that moment Janine came striding into the sitting room, dressed in riding clothes and looking the picture of health.
‘Can we have a word outside, Dr Beaumont?’ she asked.
‘Yes, of course,’ he replied, and with a smile for the man on the sofa said, ‘I’ll be back shortly, Philip. Don’t run away.’
‘That will be the day,’ he grunted, and waved them out of the room.
‘Your father has told me that you are aware of the genetic implications of his illness,’ Steve said once they were alone
‘Yes,’ she told him calmly. ‘I’ve known from the beginning, but I’ve only just found out that his uncle had it. It would seem that you were the only person who knew that.’
‘That is so, but I didn’t know that and mentioned it to your mother. She was immediately very concerned on your behalf.’
‘Yes, I know, and when she told me I wasn’t exactly over the moon either. I’ve thought about it long and hard and have discussed it with the man I’m going to marry, and he and I are agreed that what we don’t know about we are less likely to fret about.
‘I wanted to call off the wedding. Didn’t think it was fair to Dale to marry me with something of that sort hanging over me, but…’ Her composure faltered for the first time and there was a wobble in her voice as she went on to say, ‘He says if he doesn’t marry me, he won’t marry anybody. So that’s what we’ve decided. We know the risk. Yet there are lots of people in Dad’s family and no one else has been struck down with motor neurone disease so far.
‘I might change my mind about all this when, or if, we want to start a family. I wouldn’t want to bring a child into the world if I had the gene and might pass it on to my baby. But we’re not bursting to become parents for a long while yet.’
‘I can see the sense in your reasoning.’ he told her. ‘Out of those who do have the illness, it is only a small percentage who develop it from genetic sources. The trouble with motor neurone disease is that no one knows where it comes from. If they did, the medical profession might be able to do something about it. Yours will have been a difficult decision to make and I can tell that it hasn’t been made lightly.’
When he went back into the sitting room Philip looked at him anxiously and Steve said reassuringly, ‘Janine has told me what she’s decided and I will respect her decision. She might want to change her mind at some time in the future and the opportunity to know for certain will still be there.
‘And now what about you? I can see that your breathing isn’t good. How’s it been since I saw you last week?’
‘Difficult,’ Philip wheezed. ‘I never go upstairs these days.’
‘How about a stair lift?’
‘I suppose we could get one fitted. Though I want to be as little trouble as I can for Anna.’
‘Pressing a button to send you upstairs isn’t going to cause her any problems.’
‘All right, we’ll see to it,’ he promised. ‘And by the way, I believe you told Anna that you were suffering from a serious illness when you left the village, yet you never said anything.’
‘That was because I didn’t want to talk about it. I had cancer.’
‘Cancer? Oh, no!’
‘Oh, yes, I’m afraid. I had to have one of my testicles removed. I’ve been clear ever since, but it seems as if the operation has made me infertile, and I was so desperate for a child I just couldn’t cope. The guy who did the surgery said my other testicle was perfectly healthy, that I should be able to father children, and apparently it still is. But the chances of me ever making Sallie pregnant are doubtful.
‘All our efforts to make a baby in the months after the surgery came to nothing and suddenly I snapped. Sallie was there for me every step of the way, but I just couldn’t stand any more kindness. And there you have it.’
‘And we never knew!’
‘Nobody knew, except Sallie and Colin. I was so knotted up with hurt pride and frustration I wasn’t fit to live with, and in the end I took myself off.’
‘And you came back because of the vacancy in the practice?’
‘Yes, in a way. I’d wanted to come back for a long time, but wasn’t sure what sort of a reception I would get from Sallie. When Colin asked me to take over from him, it was the answer to my prayers—the chance to come back with some dignity, even though I didn’t deserve it. When I look at you, and think of what I was like then, I could die of shame.’
‘You shouldn’t feel like that,’ Philip said firmly. ‘For a man who desperately wanted children, it must have been a nightmare.’
‘It still is, but I’m not here asking for sympathy. I’m here to see you. Now, tell me exactly how you feel with regard to breathing, swallowing and mobility.’
CHAPTER FIVE
DRIVING back to the surgery, his conversation with Philip was uppermost in Steve’s mind. Telling his friend about the past had been a reminder that Sallie was keeping her thoughts about it to herself for the most part. Except for her early morning outburst after Liam’s gastric upset. It had been then that he’d told her he would never ever make love to her again unless she asked him to, and he’d meant it.
But it didn’t stop the ache inside him when at the end of each day they went to their separate beds. One night he heard her sob in her sleep and when the sounds of distress came again he went and quietly opened the door of the main bedroom.
The curtains were drawn back and in the light of a full moon he could see the outline of Liam’s cot and beside it the slender figure of his wife in the king-size bed. As he looked down at her his eyes widened. Deeply asleep, she was clutching an old shirt of his in her arms, and as he tried to take in what he was seeing hope was born.
He knew better than anyone that when o
ne was missing a person desperately to be able to hold onto something belonging to them brought a degree of comfort. In his case it had been a soft leather glove of Sallie’s that he’d found in the glove box of the car.
When he’d known he was going to be seeing her in the flesh, he’d put it back where he’d found it, and there he intended it to stay as a reminder of the biggest mistake he’d ever made.
He knew instinctively that she would not want to come out of her dreams to find him standing over her while she was clutching his shirt. So he quietly went back to bed and for the first time since his return slept dreamlessly for the rest of the night.
At breakfast the next morning Sallie was her usual self and it was hard to imagine that he’d heard her sobbing in her sleep. He’d glanced through the open door of the bedroom as he’d made his way to the kitchen and there had been no sign of the shirt.
It was almost as if he’d dreamt the whole episode, but he knew he hadn’t. He also knew it wouldn’t be a good idea to mention it. If Sallie thought he was prowling around the bedroom while she was asleep, she wouldn’t be happy about it. She might want a bolt on the door, and that really would be reducing their present situation to a sorry state of things.
Liam was old enough to sit in a high chair now and it was smiles all round from him as Sallie gave him his breakfast. As Steve was pouring himself a glass of juice, she said suddenly, ‘I passed the house on Bluebell Lane yesterday. I couldn’t see much of it from the road as it’s set well back among the trees, but it was clear that the builders are making good progress.
‘One of the workmen was coming off the site as I stopped to look and I asked him who had commissioned them to build the house. He said he didn’t know, that only the boss, Jack Leminson, knew, and all he was saying was that it was for someone who had once lived in the area.’
‘So you’re no wiser.’
‘No. I suppose I was being nosy, asking. But there is something about the place that seems to reach out to me.’
‘Really? I wonder why,’ he murmured.
As they waited for Melanie to come back from America, Sallie couldn’t understand why Steve wasn’t doing anything about finding the two dancers somewhere to live. She’d come up with a few suggestions of her own, but he always seemed to have a reason why they wouldn’t be suitable and, being unaware of what was going on in the background, she didn’t understand his lack of concern.
She hoped that he wasn’t going to suggest they all live together for a time, as there just wasn’t enough room. It would be chaotic. But knowing how fond he was of Liam he might see it as a way of staying near him, she thought.
With no such idea in mind, Steve was checking dates and schedules and trying to put his plans in place, but it seemed as if Melanie was going to be home before the house was finished, and they were going to have to start vetting any accommodation that was available.
To his relief, she phoned yet again with another change of plan, informing them that the show had been extended by two months and would it be too much to ask of them to care for Liam for a little while longer?
This time it was Sallie who answered the call and told Melanie, ‘Of course we will. As a matter of fact, we haven’t found you anywhere to live yet. We are working on it and the extra two months will give us more time to find something. But,’ she cautioned, ‘don’t leave it any longer than that, Melanie. These are precious days in your baby’s life and you’re missing them.’
‘Yes, I know, Sallie,’ she said in subdued tones. ‘I won’t stay over here a moment longer than I have to. I’m only hanging on for the money.’
‘So it means we have more time to find them accommodation,’ Steve said when he heard what had been arranged. He looked relieved and she thought that she’d been mistaken in thinking he wasn’t concerned.
The next day he waited until he was away from the surgery and then phoned Jack Leminson.
‘When will you be able to give me a completion date?’ he asked.
‘Soon,’ he was told in a cautious manner.
‘How soon is soon, Jack?’
‘You’ll be in for Christmas. Is it still meant to be a surprise?’
‘Yes, as far as I’m concerned.’
‘Well, watch out when you come round here that old Henry Crabtree doesn’t see you. He lives next door and wanders around the site, picking up any bits of wood lying around for his fire. He’s very curious about who his new neighbours are going to be, and as the old guy is no fool you can bet your life he’ll put two and two together if he gets a sight of you.’
‘It’s a wonder he hasn’t seen me already, then.’
‘He’d have said if he had. Henry likes to chat.’
For as long as anyone could remember, there had been a café on the main street of the village. It had been a clean but rather old-fashioned place that had served meals and snacks to villagers and also to the walkers who came and went through the beautiful Cheshire countryside.
At the end of summer the elderly couple who owned it had retired and moved into private accommodation, and there had been no activity there since, much to the disappointment of those who loved to explore the countryside all the year round.
As Christmas approached there were suddenly signs of life inside the empty café. Old fixtures and fittings were being ripped out and a new kitchen was being put in. The shopfront was being altered and new furniture being delivered.
It created much interest among local residents. Some were saying that they hoped it wasn’t going to end up a glass and chrome establishment as that wouldn’t fit in, and others felt that, whatever it turned out to be like, it would be an improvement on what had been there before.
When Steve saw that Jack’s firm was involved in the refurbishment he went round to Bluebell Lane to make sure that the work on his house wasn’t coming to a halt because of the other job.
‘No,’ Jack told him. ‘The gang at the café are extra men I’ve taken on. I know how keen you are to have your property finished, and it will be completed by Christmas at the latest. It’s my eldest daughter, Cassandra, and her partner who’ve bought the café. They’ve put every penny they’ve got into it, taken out a hefty loan and are determined to make a success of it.’
‘That shouldn’t be hard,’ Steve commented. ‘There’s no competition. Walkers with muddy boots won’t want to lunch at the Kestrel, will they?’
The builder sighed. ‘It’s clear that you’re not tuned into the grapevine. Someone has applied for planning permission to open a coffee-bar right opposite.
‘Really! That’s unfortunate.’
‘Sure is,’ Jack said. ‘We’ll just have to hope that the demands of the two don’t overlap. The café will be open very soon, so it will have time to make its presence felt before anything happens regarding the coffee-bar.’
When he told Sallie about the café he said, ‘So I suggest that we dine there sometimes to give the young couple some support.’ She didn’t agree or disagree, just asked where he’d got his information from, and as there was no way he was going to tell her that, in case she started putting two and two together, he skirted around the truth by telling her that it seemed to be general knowledge.
The activity continued and, finally, Cassie’s Place was due to open the following Saturday. ‘How about we eat at the new café on its first day of opening to help give it a boost?’ suggested Steve. ‘We can either take something with us for Liam, or order a baby portion for him.’
It hadn’t been mentioned since he’d first told Sallie about it and he wondered if she’d remembered him suggesting that they should eat there sometimes. If she had, she didn’t seem to be in any hurry to take him up on it and now she seemed only mildly interested as she said, ‘Yes, I suppose we could. I know Cassandra Leminson from way back. She was a wild child.’
‘Surely that isn’t why you aren’t keen on going?’
‘Not necessarily.’
‘Or could it be that you just don’t want to go wit
h me?’
‘You’re reading an awful lot into a moment’s hesitation,’ she said. ‘Of course we’ll go if that’s what you want. If we don’t support local traders, we won’t have any shops or cafés.’
She wasn’t going to tell him that she’d had to call someone into her consulting room to restrain the difficult teenager on one occasion after the girl had struck her.
It had happened after Steve had left and was all water under the bridge as far as she was concerned because Cassandra’s hormones had been all over the place at the time. She’d generally been a very mixed-up teenager.
Sallie was pleased to hear that she was settling down and wished her and her partner success in their new venture, but it didn’t stop her from wishing that it was someone more amenable that Steve was so keen for them to support.
For his part, Steve wondered if it was always going to be that way, that every time he suggested doing something together, it turned into an issue.
‘Hello, Dr Beaumont,’ Cassandra said awkwardly when she saw her. ‘Thanks for supporting us on our opening day.’
Sallie looked around her and smiled. ‘This is really something, Cassandra. You’ve transformed the place.’
She was thinking that the twenty-two-year-old had also transformed herself. The tarted-up, overweight adolescent had been replaced with a slimmer, toned-down version and it could have a lot to do with the toddler that the Leminson family were so devoted to.
The walls of the café had been painted in the palest of sunshine yellows, with views of the surrounding countryside hung upon them. The tables and chairs were of light golden wood with bright turquoise cloths, white china and sparkling cutlery, and beyond them, clearly on view was an immaculate kitchen.
‘Thank you,’ the young proprietress said, her colour rising, and turned to the young man beside her, who was wearing a chef’s hat. ‘Can I introduce my partner, Jonathan?’
When they’d shaken hands Cassandra’s glance went to Liam, who was looking around him from the safety of Steve’s arms, and she remarked, ‘I didn’t know that you had a baby.’
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