‘Well, at least one of you cared enough to come and say goodbye to me.’
‘Daddy, did you know that a polar bear’s skin is really as black as his nose? And the fur is a pure, clear colour—it just reflects the visible light.’
‘Sometimes, Dominic, I wish you would just come out and say exactly what you mean. There are times when this habit of yours, talking through stories, can be quite infuriating and this is one of them, I’m afraid.’
Dominic, so easily cut by Daddy’s impatience, moves not one muscle in his face. ‘Nothing is quite what it seems, is it, Daddy? And it never really has been. I heard about a family who lived in London. There were five children, four girls and a boy. And d’you know what they did?’
‘No, Dominic, what did they do?’ Tortured by the turn of events it is all Robin can do to muster this last shred of patience, but his pretty little son has always been such a sensitive child and it’s so important…
‘They didn’t like their mother much. So they kept her prisoner for four months, down in the basement, down in their father’s sauna. He wasn’t there. He was a very important man with no time to waste. He’d gone away and left them.’
As Robin stares up, the sun glares into his watering eyes. ‘What an extraordinary imagination…’
‘And I was just wondering, Daddy, what would happen to this famous man if people got to hear about what happened. The mother wouldn’t mind—the mother’s happy now. The children wouldn’t mind—they’re safe and looked after. Nobody would mind about people finding out—except the father. Anyway, that’s what I think.’
‘Are you trying to tell me… are you honestly expecting me to believe… This is absurd!’
‘I have even taken some pictures with the Instamatic you gave me, and they’re very good, sharp. I focused it just like you showed me. I think some people would call them scandalous pictures. But what I would really like is a darkroom of my own and some proper photographic equipment. Mummy says that it’s far too expensive, but she wouldn’t be able to do anything if you insisted that I had it.’
‘This is quite unbelievable! I don’t know what’s going on here, Dominic, or quite what you are getting at, but I’m going to go back and have a long talk to Caroline about this right now.’
Dominic’s smile is sugar-sweet. ‘If you do that, Daddy, I think you’ll find that the newspapers have those pictures, probably by next Tuesday. Because wouldn’t they be interested to know, wouldn’t people like Kitty Beavers-St Clair love to hear all about it—and wouldn’t they wonder what sort of person you really were, with your children doing that while you were there, talking to them all, telling them about the world on TV. I think it would make a wonderful story. Whose side d’you think they’d all be on, Daddy?’
Robin’s voice is thin, tense as his mouth. Can this sweet-talking boy be just ten years old? ‘In the sauna?’
‘In the sauna.’
‘For four months?’
‘For four months.’
‘Locked in?’
‘Locked in.’
‘And Mrs Guerney? What about Ilse?’ Robin feels trapped, shut in, imprisoned—surely this cannot be true—and if it is true, where will this leave him? Never to be free for the rest of his life, from childish demands, from fear of exposure? Powerless—dependent on this child? ‘It’s not true—I would have known!’
Dominic shrugs. The thin white T-shirt strap slips over one bronzed shoulder. ‘I think I might like to be a photographer when I’ve seen the world. And I’d like to sail. I’d like a yacht of my own one day. I expect Vanessa and Camilla and Sacha and Amber will all have their own dreams too, when they’re older. Loving us all as much as you do, you’ll want to know what their dreams are too, Daddy, won’t you?’
See, Jane, see. Look, Jane, look. Here is Mummy. Here is Daddy. Perfect mother. Perfect father. Just like books.
‘He’s gone. Bloody hell,’ and Lot surfaces, wiping his brow, from where he’s been scything the nettles.
‘That was nearly a terrible scene!’
But now it’s all peace, perfect peace at Poppins.
With the drumbeat pounding down from above, Robin’s two wives collapse in their chairs. There’s so much to say but it’s much too soon; it’s much too early to speak yet.
As she flaps a hand to cool herself, Caroline, who has despised herself for so many years, gazes across at her children fondly. She flicks a leaf from the hem of her skirt. A dragonfly hovers over the checked tablecloth and all the air is a soft summer buzzing. She tilts her straw hat and closes her eyes as Suzie leans forward to pour the tea.
She smiles with relief when she hears the car pull away. Dominic was gone a long time. She wants to weep when he comes to hold her hand, a dry, firm, warm little paw in her own. For an awful moment she feared she might lose him to Robin, such an oversensitive child, in tune to the pain of other people and wise beyond his years. Not so impulsive or impassioned as poor Vanessa. With tender loving care he will go far.
She sighs. There is nothing else for it, they will just have to cope with Robin’s attack, and be ready whenever it comes. At least, now, she is not alone. She and Suzie can fight him together.
She brushes a moth from her cheek. This morning she woke up to discover a note on her pillow. The notepaper said Save the Whale. ‘I have been thinking. When I get through this, if I get through this, I think I might like to be your friend. Sincerely yours, Vanessa.’
In the soft dawn light Caroline crept up the twisted stairs and returned it, after first crossing out the signature and replacing it with her own - Caroline.
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1993 by Gillian White
cover design by Mumtaz Mustafa
978-1-4804-0215-7
This edition published in 2013 by Open Road Integrated Media
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New York, NY 10014
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GILLIAN WHITE
FROM OPEN ROAD MEDIA
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