‘I’m sure your gran would love to see you.’ Lola looked at her daughter thoughtfully. ‘Is there anything wrong?’
‘Not wrong exactly,’ said Bey after she’d swallowed a mouthful of chicken. ‘Just . . .’
‘Want to talk about it?’
‘Not yet.’
‘OK.’ Lola knew better than to press her. Years before, Paige Pentony had told her that it would be better for Bey to be more open and honest about her feelings, but despite the outgoing person Bey had once been, she never blurted out her innermost thoughts. She didn’t have social media accounts and preferred to keep her personal life personal. Lola loved that about her, although she sometimes yearned to have the kind of conversations that some of her colleagues seemed to have with their daughters – where nothing was off limits and everything was out in the open. Nevertheless, she respected Bey’s sense of privacy and wouldn’t dream of violating it.
‘How’s Terry?’ asked Bey when she’d finished her curry and settled back on the sofa.
‘He’s fine,’ said Lola.
‘You’re getting along well?’
‘That’s the kind of question I should be asking you about your boyfriend,’ remarked Lola.
‘You could if I had one at the moment,’ said Bey.
‘I thought perhaps you’d come home because you wanted my motherly advice on boyfriends past or future.’
Bey winced. ‘I don’t need advice,’ she said. ‘I know what I have to do.’
‘There’s someone?’
‘Not the way you think.’
‘Tell me.’
‘He’s unsuitable,’ said Bey. ‘It can’t work out. I just need to get my head around it.’
‘Oh, Bey.’ Lola leaned across the sofa and hugged her. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘I’ll be fine, Mum,’ she said. ‘I always am, you know.’
‘You always seem to be,’ said Lola. ‘But that’s another thing entirely.’
The following morning, Bey got the bus to Cloghdrom. Her grandmother was waiting at the door of the cottage to meet her when she walked up the pathway from the main house.
‘You look fantastic, Gran,’ said Bey after she’d thrown her arms around her and hugged her. ‘Country living sure as hell keeps you looking young. I should try it myself.’
‘Really?’ Eilis kept her arm linked in her granddaughter’s.
‘Maybe not,’ admitted Bey. ‘But I should certainly come here more often. Is Grandad around?’
‘He’s in the farmhouse with Milo,’ said Eilis. ‘He’ll be back later this afternoon. So you and I have plenty of time for a natter.’
She led the way into the kitchen and nodded towards the coffee machine.
‘Make your fancy coffee,’ she said. ‘Make one for me too.’
‘What would you like?’ asked Bey as she took some capsules from the brightly coloured container on the worktop.
‘Just plain black. I’ll put milk into it myself,’ said Eilis.
Bey fiddled with the machine and brought the two coffees to the table.
‘So.’ Eilis looked at her. ‘D’you want to tell me right away what has you back here, or do you want to faff around with the pleasantries first.’
‘Gran!’
‘Well it’s clear as day that there’s something wrong,’ said Eilis. ‘You look positively gaunt.’
‘I don’t.’
‘Black shadows under your eyes and a hangdog look on your face.’
‘Even Mum didn’t say that,’ said Bey.
‘She wouldn’t,’ Eilis said. ‘She’s afraid of you getting annoyed with her. But I’m your granny and I can say what I like. Man trouble, I’m guessing.’
‘Oh, Gran.’ Bey sighed. ‘I’ve been very stupid.’
‘Well you certainly aren’t the first and you definitely won’t be the last, so I don’t know what you’re worried about,’ said Eilis. ‘Tell me.’
Bey told her about Will Murdoch and Cádiz while the coffee in the cup in front of her went cold.
‘Let me get this straight,’ said Eilis when she’d finished. ‘You’ve had a shine for this man since before he was married?’
‘I just fancied him a bit,’ said Bey. ‘I thought there was a connection. I don’t know why because he certainly didn’t think so or he wouldn’t have got married to someone else in the first place.’
Eilis said nothing.
‘I know it was wrong, Granny. I didn’t mean to kiss him.’
‘Well, we all do things we don’t mean to. That’s as far as it went?’ Eilis asked. ‘A kiss?’
‘It sounds so pathetic to say yes,’ Bey replied. ‘I mean, a kiss. What’s in a kiss, after all? But it was still a kiss with someone I shouldn’t have kissed and . . . and somehow it seemed to be a whole lot more.’ She swallowed hard. ‘And I want to do it again.’
‘That’s not great,’ said her grandmother.
‘I know. I know. That’s why I had to get away!’ cried Bey. ‘You’d think it’d be easy, wouldn’t you? To just put someone out of your head? But it’s hard, Gran. It really is.’
‘It’s certainly hard if you’ve been carrying a torch for him ever since you started working with him,’ said Eilis.
‘I haven’t been thinking about him all that time,’ Bey told her. ‘I’ve gone out with other men, you know.’
‘You say that as though they were a penance for you.’
‘Not at all,’ protested Bey. She sighed. ‘I don’t pick the right ones. I can’t stick with any of them. I can’t seem to adapt to what they want me to be.’
‘No woman should let herself be anything other than who she wants to be,’ said Eilis, which made Bey give her a watery smile. ‘As for not sticking with one man, your mum blames herself for that.’
‘She does?’ Bey was astonished. ‘Why on earth would she?’
‘She thinks she set you a bad example,’ said Eilis. ‘With the relationship she has with your dad.’
‘I’d hardly measure relationships by the one Mum and Dad have,’ said Bey.
‘Lola never properly got over her decision not to tell your father about you. She wanted to and she didn’t and she regrets that very much.’
‘I thought I was the one who wanted him to know about me,’ said Bey in surprise.
‘When you were much smaller, she was going to tell him. And then she changed her mind. And she thinks that was a mistake.’
‘She never told me that,’ said Bey. ‘She must have had her reasons, though, and I’m OK with them, whatever they were. But I don’t have some kind of father complex – whatever other problems I might lay at Dad’s door, my problems with men aren’t one of them. They’re nothing to do with Mum either. They’re all my own.’
‘So you blame yourself for this kiss business?’ asked Eilis.
‘It was my own silly fault.’
‘He doesn’t share any of it?’
‘I don’t want him to.’ Bey looked into her coffee cup and then up at her grandmother again. ‘I want him to be happy with Callista and have a great marriage and not think about me at all.’
‘Men can compartmentalise,’ said Eilis. ‘Women are terrible at that. We keep going on and on about things, letting them take over our heads until we’re wrecked. Meanwhile the men aren’t in the slightest bit bothered. Your Will Murdoch probably hasn’t given that kiss another thought.’
‘I know.’ Bey groaned. ‘And despite what I just said, that makes me feel even worse. One, because it meant so little to him. And two, because he could forget about Callista like that and I didn’t think he was that sort of person. Of course my judgement of men is terrible. We all know that.’
‘You don’t have a monopoly on misjudging men,’ said Eilis. ‘I had a bit of a mishap with one myself when I was younger. I thought he loved me. I was going to spend the night with him in a fancy hotel in Dublin. And then, when I got there, I discovered that he was a married man himself.’
‘Gran!’ Bey was shocked.
‘Oh, you young things don’t have a monopoly on messy relationships,’ said Eilis. ‘Sex didn’t start with your generation, you know.’
‘So . . . so what happened with you and him?’ asked Bey.
‘I turned on my heel and went straight back home,’ said Eilis. ‘I married your grandfather, who I’d always thought was boring, and we’ve had the best marriage a couple could have. And that’s what will happen to you one day. You just have to open up to the right person coming along.’
Bey was silent.
‘Will Murdoch is not the right person,’ said Eilis.
‘I keep telling myself that over and over,’ said Bey. ‘I’m truly terrible, Gran. I’m so ashamed of myself. I wish it wasn’t part of me. Wanting something that belongs to someone else and just taking it. I have form in that department, as you well know.’
‘Is that what this is really about?’ cried Eilis. ‘Are you banging on about that stupid ring again? You were twelve years old when that happened!’
‘Stealing a ring, stealing someone’s husband – it amounts to the same thing. It really bothers me that I can’t stop myself doing things I shouldn’t.’
‘How old are you?’ demanded her grandmother.
‘Twenty-seven. I should have more sense.’
‘And in all those years, how many things have you done that you shouldn’t?’ Eilis continued as though Bey hadn’t spoken.
‘Millions, I should think,’ she said.
‘And life’s gone on all the same,’ said her grandmother. ‘Remember when you were small and you played skittles with the fresh eggs on my kitchen floor? Turned it into a sea of yolk?’
‘Oh gosh, yes.’ Bey covered her mouth with her hand as she recalled the incident. Her grandmother had been incandescent with rage.
‘And the time you got into the sheep dip with all your dolls?’
‘Um . . . yes.’
‘And the time you came to stay and offered to do the ironing and you went to answer the phone and burned my best blouse?’
‘I . . .’
‘And the time you opened the oven door to check my soufflés and ruined them?’
‘Yes, but—’
‘Millions is right,’ said Eilis. ‘But guess what, Bey. The world is still spinning and you’re still standing and we all still love you.’
‘Because you’re my family and you have to,’ said Bey.
‘We love you because we know you. And we know you want to do the right thing.’
‘But I don’t always succeed.’
‘Life would be boring if we always got it right first time,’ said Eilis. ‘You should know that it’s how you react to your mistakes that’s the important thing. What you learn and how you get back up after being knocked down. And you always get up, Bey.’
‘Mostly my mistakes have been mistakes for me,’ said Bey. ‘But kissing Will . . .’
‘Forget about it!’ Her grandmother reached out and squeezed her hands. ‘Of course you shouldn’t have done it. But you’ve punished yourself enough.’
‘I can’t help feeling like I should be punished more,’ admitted Bey. ‘My punishment after taking the ring was being abducted by Raymond Fenton. I don’t know what punishment will come to me for kissing Will.’
‘How many times have you been told that being abducted wasn’t a punishment?’ demanded Eilis. ‘It was something that happened, that’s all. If you’re waiting for a bolt of lightning to hit you because of a moment of madness with a colleague – well, you’re far, far sillier than I ever thought. What you have to do, missy, is what they all tell you to do these days. Build a bridge and get over it.’
Bey laughed shakily.
‘He’s not important,’ said Eilis. ‘Your life is what matters.’
‘But his marriage . . .’
‘Is his problem, not yours.’
‘I know that really,’ said Bey. ‘I do. I keep thinking I’ve got over it. But then I see him and . . .’
‘You have a great job that you’re good at,’ said Eilis. ‘But no job is more important than your own happiness.’
‘I wish I hadn’t done it.’
‘The milk is already spilt,’ said Eilis. ‘The eggs are already broken. The soufflés are already flat. No wishing can change that. But it’s only milk and eggs, pet.’
‘I suppose you’re right,’ said Bey.
‘I know I am. Now come on, let’s put it behind us and have a lovely day.’
That evening, Bey went to the farmhouse to have dinner with Milo and Claire and her cousins. It brought her back to her childhood, when they’d all sat around the same table together, bickering and squabbling but having fun and believing that nothing but good things were around the corner.
We make our own happiness, she thought as she went to bed later that night. And we make our own good things.
I think I’d forgotten that until now.
By the time she returned to London, she’d made up her mind. She couldn’t stay at Van Aelten and Schaap any longer. Haute joaillerie was all very well, but she needed to go back to Ireland, to be with the people who loved her and understood her. And she needed to be away from Will.
Having made the decision, she found her thought process about the tiara much clearer, and she moved from pencil sketches to computer design, rendering the piece in three dimensions and seeing clearly where the sapphires would sit and how the tiara would look on the Duquesa’s head. She had a silver model of it made and asked Iolanda to try it, testing it for comfort and wearability, though obviously when the stones were set it would be much heavier. She mailed photos of it to the Duquesa, who was enchanted and said that it channelled the one her great-grandmother had owned while having its own contemporary style. Gerritt Van Aelten was delighted. Everyone in the company loved it. She basked in their admiration for a few days before calling into Gerritt’s office to tell him of her decision to resign.
He was shocked.
‘Perhaps a leave of absence?’ he suggested when she told him that her reasons for leaving were personal.
‘I’m afraid not,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry. I’m telling you now so that you can organise a replacement. I’ll stay until the work on the next collection is completed, which should give you plenty of time.’
The only people who knew about her imminent departure were Gerritt and the management team. He said he didn’t want to disrupt the general staff by telling them, and she was perfectly happy with that. Six weeks later, he called her in to say that they’d found their new chief designer.
‘Clara is coming back,’ he said.
Bey looked at him in astonishment.
‘It appears that New Zealand wasn’t all she expected it to be,’ said Gerritt. ‘She wanted to come home.’
‘And her husband?’
‘They’re divorcing. It’s a pity for her personally, but obviously it’s come at an opportune time for us.’
Bey was sorry that things hadn’t worked out for Clara and sent her an email saying so.
Onwards and upwards , Clara replied. And thankfully it turned out that we didn’t have children after all, so there’s no trauma there. I’m looking forward to getting back in the saddle at Van Aelten. I like what you’ve done in my absence but I’ve got lots of new ideas.
So that’s that, Bey said to herself. You come, your star burns brightly for a while and then you leave and you’re forgotten. Only the gemstones remain, glittering on, ready for the moment when someone rich and happy owns them.
Will arrived in her office unexpectedly one evening after her departure had been announced. He closed the door behind him then asked if her decision had anything to do with him.
‘Why on earth should it?’ she asked.
‘You know perfectly well why,’ he said. ‘Ever since Cádiz, you’ve avoided me like the plague. And I wanted to say that if you’re leaving because of me – please don’t. I’ll go if my being around you makes you uncomfortable. I can find somewhere else to work. You’re too good at this
to walk away, Bey. Especially if it’s because of me.’
‘Your arrogance is breathtaking,’ she said. And then she gave him the warmest smile she could. ‘Of course it’s nothing to do with you. I’ve been away from home for too long, that’s all.’
‘But what are you going to do back in Ireland? There aren’t any jewellers of Van Aelten and Schaap’s standard there.’
‘I’m sure some of them would disagree,’ she said.
‘Are you going to work for your family?’
‘Not at all,’ she said. ‘I’m going to work for myself.’
‘Bey . . .’
‘Honestly, Will, it’s what I want to do.’
‘If I believed you, I’d be happy for you. But how can you go back to making cheap trinkets when you’ve designed for Van Aelten?’
‘Cheap trinkets!’ She made a face. ‘Less expensive than the baubles here, certainly. Fewer contessas and duquesas and wives of Russian oligarchs, that’s true. But I won’t be making disposable jewellery, Will. I’ll be making quality pieces at affordable prices.’
‘Have you got a plan?’ he demanded.
It was only a vague one, more in her head than on paper. But she nodded.
‘I’ll miss you,’ he said.
‘No you won’t,’ she assured him, reaching out gratefully to answer her phone. ‘Not in the slightest.’
Before moving back to Dublin, she contacted Martín Jurado and asked if there was any chance of interning with his family firm again for a few weeks so that she could renew her silversmithing skills. He was shocked to hear that she was leaving Van Aelten and Schaap but delighted that she’d called. The studio flat above the workshop was free, he told her. If she wanted to spend a couple of months there, they’d be delighted to have her.
And so she went back to Córdoba and once again walked the narrow twisting streets, soaking up the atmosphere of the city. The colours and the scents fired a million ideas in her brain and she visualised a range in the shape of the pretty flowers with brightly coloured stones at their centre. She showed her sketches to Martín, who nodded and then sat with her as she went back to basics, annealing her silver, shaping it carefully, hammering it, soldering it, polishing it and finally placing the complete piece on display.
What Happened That Night: The page-turning holiday read by the No. 1 bestselling author Page 31
