The Edge

by Jessie Keane

  Kit was silent, taking that in. Leon! What was the little bastard playing at?

  ‘You know, I can’t remember the last time I blacked out like that.’ Romilly ran shaking hands through her hair. ‘Primary school in assembly, I think.’

  Kit’s attention came back to her. ‘Thought you were a goner.’

  ‘Made of tough stuff, us Kanes. We bounce well.’ Romilly finished the tea. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Had enough?’

  She nodded. He’d caught her in a weak moment. If Hugh hadn’t interrupted them, anything could have happened. And the worst thing? She’d wanted it to. Suddenly she wanted to say, Look, take care. All at once she felt that putting Kit Miller in the ground would be like destroying a vital, beautiful animal. It had to be the meds they’d given her at the hospital, or the shock of the impact.

  ‘No problem.’ Kit gathered the crocks together and took them over to the sink, washed and dried them, put them away. Placed the butter and jam back in the fridge. Put the pills back in the medicine cabinet. ‘Right, I’m off now. You get your head down, OK? Couple of hours, you’ll feel better.’

  They went out into the hall.

  ‘Thanks,’ she said again, as he opened the front door.

  Kit turned and looked at her. The bloody girl was a hero. And he was getting much too pleased to see her, every time he did. Bad move. ‘Get some sleep,’ he told her. Suddenly his eyes were teasing. ‘Oh – and stop trying to get to first base with me, OK? It’s getting embarrassing.’

  Then he turned away from her and all the humour left his eyes to be replaced by something more deadly. First thing, he wanted a sit-down with Fats – and then, a fucking good word with that cunt Leon.

  99

  Later that same day the sitting room door opened at Ruby’s place and Ashok said that Lady Bray was here to see her. It had been a day of surprises, none of them welcome. That car, speeding through the crowds of the crem, heading straight for Kit. And that woman had saved him, the detective inspector called Romilly Kane. It had shocked everyone, seeing Kane lying there unconscious. All right, Ruby disliked her instinctively, because she was filth: but she was still someone’s daughter. Then the ambulance had come, and Romilly had regained consciousness, and it didn’t look as if it was too serious. But someone had tried to get Kit, and missed. No doubt about that.

  ‘I should have phoned ahead,’ said Vanessa.

  Ruby shook her head. ‘It’s fine, not a problem. It’s been a bit of a day, that’s all.’ She was trying to be polite, but she was mystified to find Vanessa here. They had never been bosom buddies, ever. There was too much history between them for that.

  ‘Can I get you something to drink?’ asked Ruby. ‘Tea, coffee?’

  ‘No, thank you.’

  Ruby sat down on the sofa and indicated that Vanessa should sit, too.

  ‘OK, what is this?’ asked Ruby. ‘I don’t think you’ve ever been here before, so why now?’

  ‘It’s a nice house,’ said Vanessa, looking around.

  ‘It is. I worked hard to get it.’ Ruby was thinking that this whole Victorian villa could fit into the hallway of Brayfield House, Vanessa’s palatial home.

  ‘There was something I wanted to talk to Daisy about, if she’s in?’

  ‘She’s not. She went down to Brayfield to see the twins. She left a note. You must have passed each other.’

  ‘Oh.’ Vanessa’s face crumpled. ‘I really should have phoned ahead, shouldn’t I? But it’s been troubling me and I just got in the car with Ivan and he drove me. He’s outside, waiting. Silly of me.’

  ‘What’s been troubling you?’ Ruby was watching her old enemy curiously. Vanessa was always so cold, so composed. But today she looked . . . rattled.

  ‘When she came down to the country, Daisy and I were talking about all that’s been happening in your family. Rob’s death was terrible. Awful. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘It’s been hard to get through,’ said Ruby, wondering where all this was going.

  ‘That day. The day of the wedding . . .’ said Vanessa.

  ‘Yes?’ said Ruby when she hesitated.

  ‘Rob’s mother – Eunice, isn’t it?’

  ‘Eunice Hinton. What about her?’ Ruby had noticed Vanessa eyeballing Eunice on the wedding day, and had thought it odd; but then, with all the horror that had followed, she had forgotten about it.

  Vanessa paused as if in thought, then went on: ‘I got such a shock when I saw her there. Realized who she was. The mother of Rob and those other two boys. Daniel and . . . Leon, isn’t it?’

  ‘That’s right. And the two girls. Sarah and Trudy.’ Ruby frowned. ‘How do you know Eunice, Vanessa?’ It seemed impossible that Vanessa would ever have mixed socially with Eunice. They were from different classes entirely. There was a huge yawning gulf between them.

  ‘Oh Lord.’ Vanessa gave a shaky laugh. ‘Where to start?’ She looked at Ruby with an accusatory glance. ‘I believe you are familiar with our London house . . .?’

  Christ, after all this time, to drag that up again! Yes, Ruby knew the London house. She’d gone to bed with Cornelius Bray there, back in the day when she’d been a Windmill girl. She’d been hopelessly in love with Cornelius, and unaware at first that he was married to Vanessa. But he was. And so Ruby had become his mistress. Maybe that was her calling in life, to always be the ‘other woman’. She’d never yet been a wife. And suddenly, that was beginning to hack her off.

  ‘I know the London house, yes,’ she said. ‘What about it?’

  Vanessa took a breath. ‘Well, she worked there. Back in the sixties.’

  ‘Eunice did?’ Ruby thought about that. Well, why not? She knew Eunice cleaned offices now, but that didn’t rule out that she had cleaned private houses, too.

  ‘Yes. She . . .’ Vanessa hesitated.

  ‘She what?’ prompted Ruby.

  ‘Not for long. Six months at most. But . . .’ Vanessa was pulling at the sleeve of her coat, her eyes not meeting Ruby’s.

  ‘Oh, come on, Vanessa. What’s the big mystery?’ asked Ruby, impatient.

  Vanessa’s eyes raised and rested on Ruby’s face. ‘It’s embarrassing,’ she said. ‘But you knew him, didn’t you? Just as well as I did. You weren’t the first and you certainly weren’t the last, either.’

  Ruby was frowning. ‘I don’t know what you’re saying.’

  ‘I’m saying that Cornelius had an affair with her. Well, hardly an affair. More a fling. The housekeeper reported it to me. And sacked her, of course.’

  ‘Eunice?’ Ruby could hardly take this in. Eunice and that randy goat Cornelius? Ruby had her own deep regrets where Cornelius was concerned. Oh yes, she’d been in love with him back in the day when she was still young and stupid. But she had soon come to know him for what he was. A chancer. A user. And a bully. That was Cornelius Bray. He’d made her pregnant, given her Daisy and Kit. Then he’d paid her off, snatched pure-white Daisy off her for him and Vanessa to raise, and disposed of Kit like so much unwanted baggage.

  ‘When I saw her at the wedding, I recognized her straight away,’ said Vanessa.

  ‘But I didn’t think you’d have much to do with the staff at the London house. I know you prefer the country.’

  ‘I told you: the housekeeper was a reliable, respectable woman and she was loyal to me. She saw what was going on and told me. Too late, as it happens.’

  ‘Too late for what?’

  ‘This Eunice person was pregnant with Cornelius’s child when she left my employ.’

  Ruby’s mouth dropped open in shock. She stared at Vanessa. ‘No,’ she said, shaking her head.

  ‘I’m telling you the truth,’ insisted Vanessa, wringing her hands. ‘This is why I wanted to see Daisy, talk to her. She asked me about something when she was down at Brayfield. I’m afraid I lied to her about it. Someone lays white flowers outside the mausoleum where Cornelius is buried, every year on his birthday. Daisy asked did I know who left them there, had I seen them, and I said no.
But that wasn’t true. I had seen them putting the flowers there, and I did know who it was. It was her. It was Eunice Hinton.’

  Ruby was thinking of Rob, Daniel, Leon, Trudy and Sarah. Five children that everyone believed to be the product of Eunice’s marriage to Harry Hinton.

  ‘Initially, I had no idea it was her doing it, and naturally that bothered me. So Ivan set up a camera, and it filmed her coming there, laying the flowers. I was puzzled, so I hired someone. A private detective. I wanted to find out who she was. It was him who made the connection with our London house, that she had once worked there. And he found out more about her, too. Much more.’

  ‘So what happened to this child? Did she get rid of it, have it adopted or something?’

  Vanessa shook her head once: no.

  ‘Did she lose the child? Miscarry?’

  Again the shake of the head.

  ‘So . . . she kept it? What about her husband, what the hell did he have to say to it all?’

  ‘The husband never knew, apparently. Poor man, he thought the child was his own. Or ignored his own suspicions on that score, if he had any, I suppose.’

  Ruby was trying to take all this in. So who . . .? Rob? She felt a sickening lurch of the stomach as she realized that Daisy could have been about to marry her half-brother.

  ‘Please tell me it wasn’t Rob,’ she said, aghast.

  ‘No. It wasn’t him.’

  ‘One of the girls?’

  Vanessa shook her head.

  ‘Christ! That only leaves Daniel and . . .’ Ruby stopped dead as she thought of Leon. Pale blond hair and startling blue eyes and a permanent chip on his shoulder over something or other. His mother Eunice’s spoiled, hateful favourite. Her baby boy.

  ‘It’s Leon,’ gasped out Ruby, a hand flying to her mouth. ‘Oh Christ! It is, isn’t it? He even looks a bit like Cornelius.’

  Vanessa gazed at Ruby and slowly nodded. ‘Yes. It’s Leon,’ she said.

  100

  Ruby went straight over to Eunice’s place after Vanessa left. She hammered on the front door, but got no answer.

  Quickly she went down the side of the building, in the alleyway running between the two houses, stepping past the bins, unbolting the gate that led into the back garden. Ruby went to the half-glassed kitchen door and tried the handle. It was locked. She went to the window. The blinds weren’t down, she could see in. She cupped a hand over her eyes and . . .

  She could see Eunice sitting there at the kitchen table, head in hands. Ruby knocked at the window. Eunice’s head lifted, her hands dropping. To her shock, Ruby saw blood on Eunice’s face. She got to her feet – lurched to her feet – and came to the back door, unlocked and opened it. She stood there and stared at Ruby. She looked dazed. There was an inch-long cut on her left eyebrow, oozing blood.

  ‘What the hell’s happened to you?’ asked Ruby.

  Eunice shook her head. Her eyes were glassy, unfocused, and her face was very pale. Ruby realized that Eunice was on the point of passing out. She stepped inside, easing Eunice back with her, taking her to the chair she’d just vacated.

  ‘What happened?’ she asked again, kneeling down in front of Eunice’s chair, taking the bloodied tissues from her shaking hands and pressing them firmly to the wound. Eunice winced but sat there and allowed Ruby to staunch the flow of blood. Her dress was spattered with it. It was on the floor, and the table. But Ruby was relieved to see that it seemed to be slowing. ‘Eunice? Can you tell me? Did you fall or something?’

  Eunice’s shoulders started to shake. Tears filled her eyes and a sound came out of her mouth, a guttural roar of pain. ‘Oh God,’ she moaned.

  Ruby watched her in alarm.

  ‘I’m so sorry.’ Eunice sobbed. ‘Oh God, poor Daisy. It’s all such a fucking mess.’

  ‘Look, keep this pressed right there, OK? I’m going to make us some tea and then you can tell me about it. All right?’

  Eunice nodded and took the tissue while Ruby put on the kettle, found tea bags, milk, and sugar – plenty of it – for Eunice. She made two mugs of tea and set them on the table, took the blood-soaked tissues from Eunice and put them in the bin. The cut over Eunice’s eye was barely seeping now, but Ruby fetched a square of clean kitchen towel and handed it to Eunice, who nodded a feeble thanks and applied it to the wound.

  ‘How did that happen?’ asked Ruby, indicating the cut.

  Eunice took in a gasping breath. Tears were pouring down her face and dripping onto her bloodstained dress.

  ‘Eunice?’ asked Ruby.

  ‘It was Leon,’ said Eunice.

  ‘What . . .?’ Ruby stared at her. ‘Leon hit you?’

  Eunice was nodding, biting her lip, the tears still flowing.

  ‘But why?’

  Eunice gulped painfully. ‘Because I was going to tell Daisy. I was going to tell her everything. I told him so this morning. I said it was wicked, it was awful, and I couldn’t go on with it a second longer. And then he hit me, told me to keep my mouth shut, or else.’

  ‘You were going to tell Daisy about Leon’s parentage?’ said Ruby.

  Eunice’s eyes flicked up in shock. ‘How do you know about that?’

  ‘Vanessa Bray just paid me a visit. She told me she’d always known about it. You and Leon. The visits every year to put the flowers at the door of the mausoleum. So it’s true. Leon really is Cornelius’s child. Jesus! That makes him half-brother to Daisy and Kit.’

  Eunice’s shoulders slumped. Then her head lifted and her eyes met Ruby’s. ‘All right. Yes. It’s true.’

  Ruby was still for a beat, taking it in. ‘Your husband . . .?’ she asked.

  ‘Harry? He never had a clue. Poor bastard.’

  ‘All right. Tell me the rest of it. Spit it out.’

  ‘I heard about you, all those years ago,’ said Eunice, her eyes suddenly bright with malice. ‘The staff at Lady Muck’s house, they talked about you and him.’

  Ruby wished the floor would open up and swallow her. Christ, the madness of youth! She had been so in love with that bastard Cornelius, had gone to the London house with him, had made love with him upstairs there. Not her finest or smartest move. But she had conceived Daisy and Kit there. Out of all the chaos, at least she’d got them. She had that to be thankful for.

  ‘We’re not here to talk about me, Eunice,’ she said, her voice hard.

  Eunice gave a shrug, her mouth drooping. ‘Well, you’re not bloody perfect, are you? Far from it.’

  Ruby eyed her coldly. ‘I loved him once, Eunice. Really loved him. I wasn’t just bored with my marriage. I didn’t even have that. So get on with it, will you?’

  ‘All right,’ said Eunice. ‘But you won’t like it, any of it.’

  101

  Eunice took the kitchen towel away from her face. It looked as if the bleeding had stopped. She put the red-stained towel down on the table, beside the two mugs of tea. Then she let out a sad, weary sigh.

  ‘Ah, Jesus! What’s to say? I had four kids to feed and I was married to a bloke who earned next to fuck-all. And then Lord Bray took a shine to me. He paid well, too.’ Her cheeks reddened. ‘I know what you’re thinking. That sounds like I was a brass or cheap or something, but I wasn’t. Not at all. I . . . I obliged him and he paid me for it. I was a real looker in them days, you know. Still am, some say. I was working there in the house and he was there too, sometimes, in his study. And so . . . it happened. More than once. Christ, my life was so fucking dull that I was glad of it. Harry was never all that in the sack.’

  ‘And you had Leon,’ said Ruby, thinking of poor bloody Harry being taken for a mug, raising another man’s child.

  ‘Yes, I did. I felt bad about it, but it was easy, deceiving Harry. I made sure to get the dates close, and Harry was kept well in the dark. He never questioned it, not once. No need to. He was convinced that Leon was his, same as the other kids.’

  Ruby was standing over Eunice, arms folded, glaring down at the woman. ‘So all these years, you’ve k
ept it a secret from everyone?’

  ‘No, not everyone. I wish I had. I told Leon when he turned sixteen,’ said Eunice. She gulped down a breath and shook her head. ‘I thought he deserved to know where he really came from. He’s got blue blood running in his veins, how could I not tell him that? I always made a big fuss of him. I . . . I was dead keen on Cornelius Bray. Oh, I know he was above me. But he liked me, you know?’

  ‘He liked fucking you, Eunice. Cornelius would have fucked a pig if it stood still long enough.’

  ‘Well, you would say that, wouldn’t you? Cornelius was good to me – but then his bitch of a wife found out we’d been together, and sacked me.’ Eunice’s eyes lit up with spite. ‘That cow. I recognized her at Rob and Daisy’s wedding. She’s aged badly, hasn’t she? For all her fucking aristocratic bloodline, she’s turned into a right old crone.’

  ‘Get on with it, Eunice,’ said Ruby.

  ‘Leon was so special to me. Very special. He still is. Not that he has much to do with me any more, not since I told him. But . . .’ Her voice trailed away.

  ‘What?’ asked Ruby.

  Eunice heaved a sharp sigh. ‘I wish to God I hadn’t said anything. I wish now that I could snatch it back, the decision to do that, because . . . it changed him. Before that, he was my little boy, golden and beautiful, a little angel, full of mischief. Soon as I told him, a change came over him. He took it bad. He was bitter. Angry.’ Eunice’s eyes met Ruby’s and they sparkled with more tears. ‘He called me a common whore. Right to my face. And you know what? My boy, my sweet baby, he slapped me. I couldn’t believe it.’

  And now he’s punching you in the face, thought Ruby. Things were getting worse. ‘It must have been a hell of a shock for him,’ said Ruby. ‘If he believed up to that point that Harry was his father.’

  ‘Anyway, it made him nasty. He threatened to tell Harry. I mean, what good would that have done? Harry was innocent. An old-fashioned man. I don’t think Leon ever did tell him. I hope not, for Harry’s sake.’

  Ruby was silent, taking all this in.

  Eunice went on: ‘He got resentful, my boy. Started going on about the life he should have led. He was Lord Bray’s son, after all. He was working alongside another of Lord Bray’s sons – Kit – and Kit had so much: he ran the manor, he had everything, and what did Leon have? Just the odd jobs Kit or Rob thought to put his way. He was a dogsbody. He didn’t feel appreciated in the least. And don’t even get me started on how he ranted on about Daisy.’