Serena came to her niece's defence. ‘Peter, it's okay. We let Poppy come in here. She's usually very good, isn't she, darling?’
She looked hard at Charlie, wanting him to help her make some sort of stand. Since Peter's arrival he had shown off all Keith's handiwork like an anxious pupil, just as she had predicted. Worse still, he had let Peter take over the carving of the beef, laughing with his bottomless good-humour when his elder brother pointed out the messy progress of his own endeavours. ‘Like a traffic accident,’ Peter had said, pointing with the knife. ‘A mess on the road.’ Everyone had laughed, except Serena, who had experienced a breathless moment of something like pure hatred. She counted to ten while the moment passed, like a fever. She was on edge and it had been a difficult week, she reminded herself, wondering in the same instant, when – if ever – such remarks would lose their power to wound. It was six years after all; well over a thousand days. No wonder the possibility of causing offence hadn't crossed Peter's mind. ‘Poppy, darling,’ she called, a little hoarsely, then turned to her mother-in-law when the summons had no effect. ‘You call her, Pamela, she always comes to you.’
Looking pleased, Pamela clicked her fingers and the dog trotted out from under the table, tail wagging hopefully. ‘Here, darling.’ Poppy cast a last wistful look at Chloe, then flopped down behind Pamela's chair, dropping her head on to her outstretched paws with a loud sigh.
The incident left a small ripple of tension, which Cassie elected to smooth away by turning to her mother and remarking that she had been rather quiet and was she feeling all right.
‘Much better now, thank you, dear,’ murmured Pamela.
‘Better? Why? Have you been ill?’
‘No… that is…’ Pamela looked helplessly at Serena, then Charlie, lost in confusion as to who among the assembled throng knew what.
‘Mum has agreed to come to Umbria with us all in August, haven't you?’ pitched in Charlie, gallantly. ‘For the whole month.’
‘Really? That's great.’ Cassie glanced from her mother to her brother, wondering if she had precipitated a moment of awkwardness or merely imagined it. In truth, she was having trouble losing herself in the weekend's celebrations. Normally she and Stephen found Ashley House the easiest place in the world to relax, but on this occasion they seemed to have packed their worries with their toothbrushes. She had returned from Frank's the previous evening to find Stephen in a state of frenzied impatience. While she packed he had paced the hall like a caged beast. Who was Frank anyway? he had demanded, once they had joined the rush-hour traffic heading south. Why did he matter so much that she not been able to turn the job down? Frank was a good customer and gay, she had retorted, too outraged at the absurdity of this childish display of jealousy to deliver the reassurance nicely. Stephen had tried then, clumsily, to back down, rambling on about not wanting her to overdo things, about the importance of her being relaxed if she was to conceive a child, but in so convoluted a fashion that Cassie had remained deeply, bitterly, unconvinced. A silence had descended, so dense and smothering that Cassie, staring fixedly out of the windscreen, had wondered that something essentially so empty could have such force. She had wondered too, for the first time, about the ferocity of the emotions of the man she was about to marry. His love for her had been like an obsession, bewitching in its intensity. His sheer refusal to take no for an answer was what had eventually won her round, made her believe – as Stephen had from the first – that the paths of their lives were destined to cross intimately and for ever. It had never occurred to Cassie that such obsession had its darker side; that loving her so much meant he would fear losing her with equal passion.
‘Please, don't start getting jealous, Stephen, will you?’ she had whispered at last, all her thoughts converging into this one vital plea as they swept past the sign for Barham.
‘Jealous?’ he had scoffed, smacking the steering-wheel. Of my work, she had said, of people like Frank… Keith. He had rounded on her then, bumping the car into the grass verge in his distraction. Jealous of Keith? What bollocks was this? On the patio that time, she had reminded him, trying to be gentle, the two of them smoking together, standing close. He had said – he had said – Stephen had pulled over on to the verge, deliberately this time, and yanked on the handbrake. What he had said, he corrected her, was that smoking endangered the likelihood and process of getting pregnant. The comment about Keith had been a joke; she was cruel and wrong to consider it otherwise. He had dropped his head on to the steering-wheel. All he wanted was for them to love each other. Nothing else mattered. Nothing at all. And if she didn't agree she'd better tell him now.
Of course she agreed. Of course. Cassie had reached across and run her fingers up the nape of his neck. She was sorry. She was tired. He was tired. They had pulled into the Ashley House drive a few minutes later, misty-eyed and holding hands. After supper they had gone upstairs early and made love. ‘We're going to make a fucking baby,’ he had whispered, the four-poster creaking gentle reluctance as he moved on top of her. ‘You – and – me – now.’ Cassie had locked her legs across his back, pressing her teeth into his shoulder, thinking that if will-power helped conception, they would surely succeed. The row had seemed like a good thing: it had brought them closer, sharpened their desire, their focus. In the morning, however, after their visit to Keith in the barn, its shadow had crept back over them, as smothering as the silence in the car.
Around the table they were still talking about Italy. Peter had produced a brochure and was passing it round. Cassie patted Stephen's leg under the tablecloth. ‘We don't have to go to Umbria,’ she whispered, wondering still at the origin and persistence of the shadow, wanting more than ever to get rid of it. ‘Two weeks of my family…’ She made a face.
‘But I love your family,’ Stephen insisted, seeming puzzled rather than reassured. ‘The villa looks fantastic. We'll have a great time. Are you looking forward to it, Ed?’ He leant across her to address her nephew, who had slouched with disappointing teenage surliness throughout the meal.
Ed blinked hard in an attempt to bring Stephen's face into focus. He had drunk a lot of champagne and he didn't know how many glasses of wine. During the flurry of pudding being served and Pamela announcing her decision to go to bed he had even tipped some of Cassie's into his glass, draining it in one swig. Every conversation of the evening could have been in a foreign language, for all he cared. He couldn't imagine Italy, or August, or finishing his exams. He couldn't think how he was going to get through the next day, let alone the next week. ‘Dunno… haven't really thought about it.’
Stephen returned his attention to Cassie, slipping his hand over the one she had placed on his leg. Things still weren't right between them, he knew. In spite of the argument in the car ending well – the love-making that had followed – he still felt bruised. He had lain awake for most of the night, trying to make sense of it, mulling over all the things that were worrying him – the stuttering progress of Jack Connolly's latest case, Cassie's obstinate absorption in her work, the pressure of the decision that they should have a child and behind it all the creeping, destructive sensation that, while the woman sitting next to him might have agreed to marry him, he still didn't really have her, not in the way he needed.
By the time the steely dawn light crept through the cracks in the curtains Stephen had found himself confronting the new, even bigger fear that maybe all this signified some fundamental shift in his fortunes, the inevitable downturn after the climax. He had had a good run, after all, meeting the love of his life and launching a successful career as a writer. Had he really been naive enough to imagine it would continue, that the unhappy ugliness of the first eighteen years of his life wouldn't re-emerge in some form, belittling his efforts to be strong and happy? Having looked forward to seeing Keith, and finding him later that morning, with his feet up on the barn's cosy oatmeal sofa, full of chat about his work at Ashley House and what Serena thought about this and Charlie thought about that, had only mag
nified these fears. Heading back to the main house with Cassie afterwards, Stephen had been beset by the insidious, unsettling notion that just as his life had hit a difficult patch Keith's had turned a corner, as if they were on some sort of invisible see-saw with the Harrisons planted in the middle. Up on one side, down on the other.
Absurd, Stephen told himself now, squeezing Cassie's hand still harder as he surveyed the splendour of the dining room, magnificently arrayed with antique glass, crockery and gleaming silver. This was his new family, his new life, he reminded himself; precisely the place where, not long ago, he had dreamed of being. How silly to be there and not enjoy it! How ridiculous. He had all that a man could want and more – more, certainly, than Keith would ever have. ‘I've been a pig,’ he whispered. ‘Forgive me?’
‘Of course,’ she murmured, kissing his cheek. It wasn't as fervent a kiss as he would have liked, but it made him feel a lot better – a lot safer.
Serena was on the point of asking Charlie to see to coffee when Peter stood up and tapped his wine glass with a knife. She sat back in her chair exhaling slowly.
‘I would just like to say,’ Peter began, ‘how excellent it is to have so many of the family gathered together and to wish you, Lizzy, the happiest of birthdays and to –’
‘Could I say something?’
‘Cassie?’ In spite of an attempt at a generous smile, Peter was put out. He had intended, as had been his father's wont, to grace the evening with a few well-chosen words, to give them what appeared to be a much-needed sense of occasion; to remind them of how unified and strong they were; to remind himself of what, at all costs, needed protecting.
‘I'd just like to say…’ Cassie searched for Stephen's hand under the tablecloth. She hadn't been listening to Peter or to anything very much except the racing of her own thoughts. A way of putting a seal on the new uneasy peace between her and her fiancé had come to her at last: a mad way, perhaps, but for those instants too heartfelt to resist. ‘The fact is… Stephen and I… that is, we are… trying for a baby. I had told Serena but I wanted to tell all of you so that…’ Cassie faltered, panicking for a moment at the expressions on all their faces and the clamminess of Stephen's palm. ‘I know it's a verypersonal thing to say,’ she pressed on, propelled by the conviction that her declaration was tantamount to a public profession of their love, their mutual commitment - just the sort of reassurance Stephen needed. She felt, too, as she spoke, as if the utterance of her hopes made them all the more real, more possible, ‘but it means so much to me – to us – that I wanted you all to know.’
There were collective murmurs, first of surprise and then encouragement. Stephen stared at his dessert plate, focusing on the melting blobs of cream, willing himself to be pleased instead of panic-stricken.
In the hubbub of the moment no one heard Ed's quiet groan of despair triggered by the word ‘baby’.
Keith, peering in at one of the windows, seeing the burnished mahogany table and the family ranged round it, their faces lit by the shadowy light of the chandelier, sighed at the perfection of the scene, glad to see his old schoolfriend enthroned at the heart of it. He was glad, too, that maybe he had contributed to the happiness of this family gathering with the rescue of the old lady. I have done what I can, he reminded himself, ducking out of sight.
Chloe, a little tense still at her aunt's announcement, her imagination unpleasantly fired with images of grown-ups having sex, pointed at the window and shrieked, ‘I saw a face! Mummy, Daddy, I saw a face – a face looking at us. A ghost! Do you think it was a ghost?’
‘Don't be silly, Chloë,’ Peter barked, still hopeful of resuming his speech, feeling rather like the captain trying to regain control of his listing ship.
‘It was probably Keith,’ murmured Serena, who had stood up and put her arms round Cassie and Stephen, sensing from their shell-shocked faces that what had been said had been unplanned and arisen from some sort of desperation. ‘It's great,’ she whispered, squeezing their shoulders. ‘If it's meant to be, it will be.’
‘If it was Keith, we should probably invite him in,’ said Charlie, crossing to the window and squinting out into the darkness.
‘Why?' asked Elizabeth, who had been struggling throughout the meal with the sensation that while the evening was ostensibly in her honour, it had had little to do with her presence. Unveiling Roland's extraordinary, wonderful portrait had definitely been the highlight. Ever since then she had been struck by how preoccupied everyone seemed. Helen had said barely a word, Peter, while trying to hide it, was obviously in a bad mood, and Serena had fired so many beady looks at Charlie that she wondered her brother's face wasn't peppered with holes. It had made her long for all the family gatherings they had enjoyed under the aegis of her dear father, when everything had felt so effortlessly ordered and her own future had seemed an open road rather than a dead end. When Roland had asked if he could slip off to the television room she had been almost tempted to join him. And then, when Peter had seemed about to impose exactly the sort of order she craved, tapping his glass to make his little speech – to remind them of why they were all there – Cassie had snatched the limelight by blurting out her quest to have a child. Which was moving and wonderful, of course, but also, Elizabeth couldn't help thinking, a little selfish. Cassie, as usual, thought the world revolved round her, when in fact, Elizabeth mused a little sadly, they were all at the centre of their own worlds, spinning like planets, held together only by the gravitational force of the family. ‘Why on earth should we invite Keith in?’ she repeated, noting, with some puzzlement, a series of hasty exchanged glances between Charlie, Serena, Helen and Peter.
‘Just because… the man's a star. He's done so much. We don't know where we'd be without him,’ Charlie faltered. ‘Thank you, Stephen, for introducing him into our lives.’
Stephen managed a nod, while inside the maelstrom of all his new doubts assailed him with fresh force. He felt as if he had entered some diabolical maze in which every route he tried failed to produce a way out. Without a baby, Cassie would be unhappy. With a baby, he would not only lose her but, worse still, disappoint her with his own, inevitable ineptitude as a parent. With only his own vile upbringing to go on, how could he not? Cassie knew some of it, of course the regular beatings, the way his mother had put her hand to her eyes as his father swung the belt. What she didn't – couldn't – know was the snivelling self-doubt, the self-loathing, the certainty of failure and disappointment that those beatings had induced. Only Keith knew that – Keith, who had parachuted back into his life from nowhere, trailing, as it now seemed, all the sourness of their past in his wake. Like a bad smell, Stephen decided, wishing he had turned his back on him in the bookshop instead of inviting the man into his home – into his life – letting him taint it all with his crooked smile and meddling efforts to turn the tide of his own bad luck. ‘Keith is a good man,’ he began, forcing the words out, only to find himself interrupted by a loud, irreverent cackle from Ed.
‘Bed for you, mate,’ growled Charlie, realizing, with guilty consternation, that his son was extremely drunk.
‘Bed for you, Chloë,’ muttered Helen, and steered her daughter – still murmuring about ghosts – from the room.
‘Come on now, Ed…’
Ed surveyed them all through half-closed eyes. ‘The point is… He twirled his empty wine glass, fed up suddenly with the throbbing in his head and all the pussyfooting around – all the exhausting aching business of secrecy. ‘The point is, Granny tried to drown herself and Keith rescued her. In the lake in the copse. But, ssh…’ He raised an unsteady finger to his lips. ‘Mum's the word.’ He lunged for his aunt's full wine glass and fell off his chair.
Keith was leaning on the fence watching the red glow of his cigarette in the dark when he heard footsteps coming towards him through the pergola. He braced himself, wondering who it was and what to say, ashamed suddenly of how he had spied on them through the dining-room window. The footsteps stopped, though the entran
ce to the pergola remained gaping and dark. It was probably the boy, Keith decided, turning as quietly as he could and resting his elbows on the fence. He waited, not wanting to scare him, expecting at any minute to see a small cloud of smoke drifting through the roses to join the wisp of grey spiralling from his own cigarette. A gust of wind caught the trees to his right, sending a flurry of blossom into the air. Keith watched as the petals fell like huge snowflakes on to the lawn, thinking with longing of his own sons and vowing to get back up north as soon as he could, no matter how menial the work he had to accept to stay there. He might have helped the Harrisons, but they had helped him too, more than they would ever know.
Something moved at last. Whoever it was had sat down, he realized. He tossed his cigarette over the fence and stepped closer to peer through the tangle of branches. He was on the point of tiptoeing away when he heard the unmistakable hiccup of tears. Female tears, he knew at once. Not Ed, then, but one of the women. Keith stepped sideways, trying to get a better view, only to find himself treading on a small branch, loosed from the trees by the wind. It broke with a loud snap.
A moment later Elizabeth hurried out of the pergola, her face tear-streaked and pale with fright. ‘Christ, you gave me a jump.’ She was breathing hard, both hands pressed to her chest.
‘I'm sorry I… I was taking a bit of air. I didn't mean to scare you. Sorry,’ he repeated, ‘I was on my way back anyway.’ He turned to go.
‘No… I… I… It's my birthday,’ she blurted, starting to cry again.
Keith swore under his breath, trying to equate the cosy scene through the window with such a startling demonstration of unhappiness. ‘Should I… Would you like me to fetch someone?’
‘No,’ Elizabeth wailed, hugging herself and shaking her head from side to side. ‘Just… could you… would you give me…’ She dropped her arms and looked at him through the straggle of her hair. ‘Actually, I could do with… a hug,’ she sobbed, taking a step towards him, then jumping backwards, waving both arms over her head as if to fend off an attack. ‘I'm sorry, ignore me, I'm out of my mind. I've drunk too much, I'm a disgrace – forgive me.’ She lurched back towards the pergola.
The Simple Rules of Love Page 19
