Pippa was quiet for several seconds, and the ticking of the giant wall clock above the table suddenly became audible. She laid her palms flat on the counter and looked Hannah in the eye. ‘I can see why you might worry,’ she said, ‘but don’t – or try not to. There’s no way Mark’s messing around – he loves you. I’ve never seen him like this with anyone else, not remotely.’
‘His ex, Laura . . .?’
‘Laura? No – no way. She was all right and he tried, but his heart was never in it. Look, however dodgy all this seems when you put it together, there’s going to be a simple explanation. Mark loves you – it’s blindingly obvious.’
‘Why lie, then? Why make up some codswallop story for his colleagues?’
‘I’ve no idea. Maybe it’s something to do with work or maybe there’s just something on his mind and he needs a bit of time on his own. You know, I think that about being married sometimes. We expect it to be easy, just to be able to adjust to being part of this intense new thing, living with someone else, but it’s not easy – in fact, it’s bloody hard, especially now we all get married at such advanced ages.’ Pippa pushed the sketches away from the pool of orange juice, apparently noticing it for the first time. ‘God, you have no idea what I’d give for a bit of time alone, a couple of days’ peace and quiet, walking on the beach somewhere, but I’d be missing Dan and the boys like mad every minute. It wouldn’t mean I didn’t love them. And Mark’s so clever and he’s always been so independent; he probably needs time alone now and again. Perhaps he hasn’t told you in case it comes across the wrong way and he hurts you.’
‘But—’
‘Sweetheart, there’s no way he’s having an affair. End of story. He loves you.’ She smiled. ‘He’s like Dan – one of the good guys.’
‘I know. Yeah, I know.’
‘Did he say when he’d be back?’
‘Tuesday morning.’
‘Talk to him then. But it’ll be nothing, I promise you. Guarantee it.’ Pippa stood up again and bent to get a saucepan out of the cupboard. She rinsed the beans and emptied them into it.
Watching her, Hannah felt a pang of envy. Whatever Pippa said – and she was grateful for her attempts to reassure her, she really was – it wasn’t nothing. Pippa’s life was going on as normal but hers, she felt, she knew, was about to change.
At the door, Pippa gave her a tight hug. ‘You’re sure you don’t want to stay for lunch?’
‘No, thank you. It’s lovely of you to ask but I’d better get on.’
‘Well, just look after yourself, okay? Try not to worry. Simple explanation – keep telling yourself that.’
‘I will. Look, Pip, I’ve been meaning to say for ages: thanks for making me feel so welcome. It’s strange, suddenly coming into a group of people who’ve all been friends since college. You’ve been so—’
‘College?’ Pippa looked surprised. ‘Oh, we weren’t at college together. Mark was three years ahead of us; he left Cambridge the summer before we started. Dan met him a few years after we finished, through work. DataPro did a project for the bank.’
On Putney Bridge Hannah swerved to avoid a bus that was pulling out from the stop without indicating and almost hit a cyclist in the blind spot on her outside. The man was Lycra-covered and sinewy, his helmet a hi-tech pointed black thing that gave him an insectoid look. She wound down the window. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she said. ‘The bus—’
‘What the fuck? Why don’t you look where you’re fucking going?’ He was older than she’d expected, fifty perhaps, and it made the language feel worse, more violent. His thin face was distorted with rage.
‘I said I’m sorry. I didn’t have a choice. And I didn’t even touch you.’
‘Stupid bitch!’ He seemed to be gathering something in his mouth and for a moment she thought he was going to spit at her. Then the driver behind leaned on the horn and the cyclist’s attention was distracted. She accelerated away quickly, icy air blasting through the window until she managed to get it wound up again.
Tears prickled in her eyes like they had last night, but this time, in the enclosed privacy of the car, she gave in to them. She blinked and they ran down her cheeks. Lie after lie after lie. Had Mark ever told her anything true? Why would he lie about when he met his friends? She was sure, absolutely sure, he’d told her that he and Dan and Pippa had been at Cambridge together, at the same time – she remembered a story about punting and a drunken picnic on the Backs. And if he’d lied about that, what else had he lied about? Perhaps he hadn’t been to Cambridge at all, or any university. Perhaps he was just a compulsive liar, one of those people who couldn’t stop themselves even when there was nothing to be gained by it. Maybe, she thought, she was about to discover that he was married to someone else and had a whole other family filed away somewhere.
Perhaps he was with them now. Whatever he was doing, wherever he was, it was a mystery to her. When she’d got in last night, she’d emailed Roisin. It had taken a while. To start with she’d written a screed, everything she’d discovered, blow by blow. Then, she’d highlighted the lot and hit delete. All these people with happy marriages – Roisin and Ant, Dan and Pippa, her brother and Lydia. She’d managed eight months, for three of which she’d lived in a different country. Tom was wrong – she was just like their mother. Actually, her mother had done years and years better.
In the end, her message to Ro had been a few lines. I owe you a proper email – sorry – but in the interim I thought I’d better let you know that Mark’s on the loose in NYC this weekend. He’s lost his phone but he’s got your number and says he might give you a call. Consider yourselves warned . . . Roisin and her iPhone were inseparable, and her response came within a minute: Nice! Next time you talk to him, order him to call us.
The rain was keeping people inside and the pavements of Quarrendon Street were empty. Hannah parked outside the house, turned the engine off and leaned her head against the steering wheel. She was exhausted; she hadn’t slept at all last night. Instead, she’d lain awake next to the undisturbed sheets on Mark’s side and been tormented by the stream of spiteful images that her mind had served up one after another.
Please, she’d thought, let him be in Rome: New York was their place. Her mind, however, had offered her picture after picture of Mark taking someone else round all their old spots. She saw him huddled at one of the tiny tables at Westville, reaching over the waxed tablecloth to take a woman’s hand, his eyes never leaving her face; she imagined them having lunch at the Boathouse then walking through Central Park, bundled up in coats and hats and scarves, kicking up fallen leaves. No doubt she was beautiful, this woman, whoever she was, but in the images she stayed vague, faceless, a slim but curvaceous outline, with a soft laugh and long shiny hair.
Later, some time after three, Hannah had thought she was falling asleep – her thoughts started to wander, to leave her in peace – but at the last moment, just as she was about to tip gratefully over the edge into oblivion, she’d seen them in her bed, not here in London but in her old apartment on Waverly, Mark propped on one elbow talking, smiling, kissing this woman like he had kissed her there. At that instant the possibility of sleep disappeared completely, and she’d thrown the blankets off and stood up, heart pounding. Down in the kitchen, she’d drunk three cups of tea and surfed the net until she was glassy-eyed and the quiet hum of morning traffic started on the New King’s Road.
Into the near-silence now came a trundling sound. Looking in the rear-view mirror Hannah saw the little boy from the house across the road pedalling furiously down the pavement on a tricycle, his mother running to keep up. Time to move; she couldn’t sit outside in the car all day. She ran the ball of her thumb under her eyes and sniffed. As she reached for her bag on the passenger seat, however, her phone began to ring.
She pulled the bag on to her lap and scrabbled to find the phone before it stopped, almost dropping it in her hurry. On the screen was a Malvern number: her mother’s. For a second or two Hannah cons
idered not answering – she could call her back later, when she was inside and feeling a bit stronger – but then she felt guilty. To Sandy, making a phone call, even to her own children, was a big deal. She’d have made a cup of tea and put it on the little table at the end of the sofa before sitting down carefully, adjusting her glasses on the end of her nose and peering at the short list of numbers that Tom had programmed into her handset last year as if it were some arcane form of symbology.
‘Hi, Mum.’
‘Hannah?’ Her mother sounded uncertain.
‘Of course it is, you daft one – you called me. How are you?’
‘Oh, fine, yes, I’m all right, darling. How are you? How’s Mark?’
‘Yes, we’re well, both of us. Just having a quiet weekend.’
‘That’s good.’ Her mother sounded relieved. ‘I’ve been busy here. I went to Waitrose this morning and bumped into Mrs Greene. She asked after you both.’
‘That was nice of her.’ Mrs Greene had taught Hannah and Tom in kindergarten; it amazed Hannah that she remembered who they were all these years later. She’d only just retired; how many hundreds of children had she had under her care in the interim?
‘And I’ve been making the Christmas pudding. The house smells like a distillery – the neighbours must be wondering what on earth I’m up to.’
‘I hope you’re trying some of it – the booze, I mean.’
‘I’m not much of a rum-drinker, it’s far too sickly, and I don’t know anyone who drinks barley wine, do you? Where’s Mark? Is he with you?’
‘He’s in New York, Mum. A business meeting.’
‘On a Sunday?’
‘No, tomorrow.’ Don’t get defensive; she’s not making a point; she doesn’t know. ‘He went over on Wednesday for a couple of others and then this one went in the diary at the last minute so he’s stayed. He’ll be back on Tuesday.’
‘Good. That’s good.’ Again, her mother sounded relieved. Sometimes, Hannah thought, her mother seemed to interpret Mark’s business travel as a sign of reluctance to be at home rather than a necessary part of running an international firm. Who knows, though? Maybe that was right.
For a mad moment, she thought about telling her mother everything, just laying it all out and throwing herself on her mercy. She wanted her support and sympathy; she wanted advice, to be told what to do. As quickly as it had come, though, the impulse was gone. It was impossible: there was no way she could reveal any of this. As soon as she let on even part of it, her mother would be proved right: she, Hannah, couldn’t do it; she wasn’t the sort of person who could hold down a relationship. She was too independent, too preoccupied with her career, too selfish. Somewhere deep in her psyche, unidentified but definitely real, something was wrong with her. Look at what had happened with Bruce; look at the disaster of the years after him. And now look at things with Mark: their marriage on the rocks in less than a year – barely more than half that.
And her mother loved Mark, absolutely loved him. Even beyond the gratitude she would have felt towards anyone who’d taken her spinster daughter off the shelf, Sandy adored him.
She’d met him for the first time at Christmas last year. Hannah had flown back from New York on the twentieth to spend a couple of days in London before going up to Malvern. Not wanting to leave all the preparation to her mother, she’d planned to take the train up a couple of days early; Mark would drive up on Christmas Eve. He, however, had got back from the office in the evening of the twenty-first and announced he’d closed DataPro early and would drive up with Hannah the next day.
If she was honest, she’d imagined his idea of helping would be to open bottles and distract them, but almost as soon as they’d arrived, he’d taken on the mantle of man about the house. While she was talking to her mother, he’d slipped outside without a word and stacked the load of logs that the log-man, finding her mother out when he came to deliver, had dumped directly in front of the garage door, blocking her car in.
The house was small – splitting the family finances had left both of their parents pretty broke – but Hannah’s mother had four or five lovely pieces of furniture that had come down through her family, and a talent for finding gems in poky old junk shops. Mark had made her take him round the house and tell him the story behind everything, the details of its period and style, where it had come from. He was particularly effusive about the Georgian card table she’d inherited from her grandmother and asked Sandy if she would keep an eye out for something similar for the house in Quarrendon Street.
Afterwards he’d lit the fire, hung the mistletoe, poured Sandy a glass of wine, then perched on the fireguard and chatted to her for over an hour while Hannah cooked supper. The house had felt different, more alive, and her mother, fluttery and nervous for the first couple of hours of their being there, had become animated, even mildly flirtatious, telling self-deprecatory stories and tales of Hannah’s childhood. ‘He’s lovely, Hannah,’ she’d whispered as they carried the dishes back into the kitchen after dinner. She’d put the stack of plates on the draining board and squeezed her daughter’s arm with excitement. ‘Really lovely.’
And then there had been Boxing Day. After breakfast Mark had suggested a walk. Hannah had tried to convince her mother to come but she’d refused with a vigour that was quite uncharacteristic. They’d spent a few minutes trying on wellies from the collection in the hall cupboard then set off for British Camp, her mother waving to them, bright-eyed, from the step.
When they’d parked the car, they’d taken the upper footpath to the Iron Age fort at the top of the beacon, the cold air and the steepness of the climb taking Hannah’s breath away. ‘I blame the pudding,’ she said after five or six minutes, trying to disguise the undignified heaving in her chest. ‘And the mince pies. And the roast potatoes. I feel like I’ve put on half a stone since yesterday.’
‘You’re still gorgeous, swede-heart. I’d take on a fortful of pagans for you.’
‘I think I’m only just beginning to understand the full extent of your power to charm,’ she said, looking at him sidelong. ‘You’ve got my mother under some sort of bewitchment.’
‘Bewizardment.’ The path flattened for a hundred yards or so and he paused to look at Herefordshire spread out in front of them, a view, Hannah always thought, that notwithstanding the occasional telephone mast and the glint of tiny cars here and there on the cotton-threads of roads across it, might not have changed in two hundred years. ‘Or bewarlockment?’ he said. ‘Which do you reckon?’
‘Whichever, it’s effective.’
He’d turned to face her. ‘Does it work on you?’
‘What do you think?’
‘I hope so.’ His expression was very serious all of a sudden and she’d felt her own smile fade. ‘Hannah, you know I love you, don’t you?’
She’d nodded, blinking against the sun that was pouring round the outline of his head and shoulders, directly into her eyes.
‘I’ve been thinking about this a lot – really, a lot.’ He’d laughed a little, making fun of himself. ‘I wondered . . . Will you marry me?’
Tom and Lydia had driven down from her parents’ house in Ludlow that evening. Sandy had wanted Hannah to ring and tell him the news as soon as she’d got off the phone with her dad and Maggie but she’d waited to tell Tom in person, wanting to see his face when she told him that she, the great unmarriageable, the romantic disaster area, the coward, was actually getting spliced.
It had started auspiciously enough. Mark had helped unload the car and referenced a line from an old Only Fools and Horses Christmas special that had made Tom laugh even before they’d been officially introduced inside by the fire. Wrapped in the long cashmere cardigan that Lydia – who was a far better daughter-in-law than she was an actual daughter, Hannah thought – had bought for her when the two of them had been shopping together, Sandy had hovered excitedly, unable to sit down for a minute even when Mark had handed her a glass of wine and urged her to take the chair in fron
t of the fire.
‘What’s up, Mum?’ Tom had said, putting his arm round her shoulders. ‘It’s a bit late in the season for ants in the pants, isn’t it? And I can’t believe you’re that excited to see me. You saw me a fortnight ago.’
Her mother had thrown Hannah an agonised look. ‘A mother’s allowed to be excited about having her family all together, isn’t she?’
‘She is. But clearly there’s something else afoot. Out with it.’
‘Hannah, tell him. Quickly, before I explode.’
‘Tell me what?’ Tom said, looking at her.
Mark moved across the room and put his arm around Hannah’s waist. She grinned at him and then at her brother, the happiness that had been bubbling through her all day threatening to spill out of control. ‘We’re getting married,’ she said. ‘Mark asked me this morning.’
Lydia gave a cry of delight and launched into a strange sort of dance with Sandy, but Hannah couldn’t take her eyes off Tom’s face. He did a pretty good job of covering it – the look was gone almost as soon as she’d seen it – but it had been there, unmistakable, an expression that combined shock and hurt and alarm.
‘Wow,’ he said. ‘My God – wow. Congratulations. That’s huge, Hannah.’
Hannah. It was all the confirmation she needed.
Tom had taken a swig of the beer Mark had poured him then put the glass down on the mantelpiece and come to give her a hug. ‘Wow.’ He’d pulled away and shaken Mark’s hand. ‘Well played, sir. I hope you know what you’re letting yourself in for?’
Mark had laughed. ‘I think so. Any advice gratefully received, though – you’re the expert.’
Sandy had disappeared momentarily but reappeared now with a tray of glasses and the bottle of champagne that had lurked at the back of her china pantry for the past five years at least but had mysteriously already been chilling in the fridge when they’d returned earlier with their news. ‘You asked my mother for permission,’ Hannah had said, when she’d seen it, and Mark had grinned.
Before We Met: A Novel Page 10
