Steph looks as though she hasn’t heard, so Izzy says, ‘He was building a women’s refuge. Trying to make amends, is what they said.’
When Steph turns round, she’s close to tears again. Her son’s death has been too hard on her, and Izzy wonders how she goes on, whether in her place, at her age, she’d think it was worthwhile. The thought must surely cross any mother’s mind. If she lost Flora, what would be the point?
Steph crosses the room and sits down on the sofa, perching on its edge, facing Izzy. There’s a depth of sadness in her eyes which matches the pain in Izzy’s heart, now she’s learning the truth about the man she married, and still loves.
‘I’m sorry, my dear,’ says Steph. ‘There’s so much you didn’t know, so much he didn’t want you to know, and I’m sure he’d be mortified that it’s all going to come out now. I understood his reasons, but I didn’t like the idea of his keeping so much from you, and I always thought he should tell you, because secrets are so very hard to keep, especially with someone in his position. People are always digging for dirt, and the sad fact is that with him, it was there to find if they came searching. I loved my son very, very much, but for a long time he was really quite hard to like.’
‘You shouldn’t talk about him that way,’ says Izzy.
‘We should talk about him honestly,’ insists Steph. ‘You mustn’t put him on a pedestal. You need to know the truth. For many years he had problems which got progressively worse. A taste for alcohol became a drink problem, and as he became better paid, he added drugs to the mix. When he was drunk, he was unpredictable and sometimes downright unpleasant.’ She looks down at her hands. ‘Duncan saved his reputation, of course, knowing the right people and pulling strings. We all paid for his drinking. It cost us our grandson, Bailey – we haven’t seen him in years. He might have children himself now, for all I know, and we might be great-grandparents. Nothing would give me greater pleasure than to see him again, or just to know how he’s doing, what path he chose in life, whether he’s happy. When Tris’s first wife, Dolly, left him, she took Bailey too. We tried to make contact with him – Duncan knew where they were – but all we heard from Dolly was that Bailey wanted nothing to do with us, because we’d be on his dad’s side. We weren’t on anybody’s side. We were just stuck right in the middle.’
‘I don’t understand,’ says Izzy. ‘It’s as if you’re talking about a different person. This isn’t the man I knew.’
‘Ah, but it is, my dear, and you need to hear the whole story and the part you played. When he was young, we thought we were truly blessed. Tris was special, our golden boy. He always did well in his exams at school, and he was popular, especially with the girls. So handsome, he was, with that blond hair and blue eyes. Women turned to look at him as he went by, and I used to feel the glow of pride.
‘For our sins, we were boastful, our son this and our son that. When friends told us how well their children were doing in nursing or IT or accountancy, we’d smugly tell them Tris had landed his first job on a newspaper. Then he got into radio, then TV – only a backroom job, but he was expecting a break to get in front of the cameras, and who could resist that smile? It was only a matter of time.
‘Our children are not to be worshipped. We look at Flora now, and think she’ll always be that delightful, sunny girl, but if that were true of all children, where do all the awful people we know come from, the cruel ones and the bad-tempered and the miserable? I don’t mean to depress you, Izzy, of course I don’t, but I began to get a sense of my son as someone lacking a strong moral compass. That’s a hard thing for me to admit, especially since he’s not here. Drink was his trigger. He’d get loud and boisterous, argumentative sometimes. I remember once when he came to us for lunch. He brought me flowers, and of course he opened a bottle of wine, and then another. We ate, and he drank, and then he said he was driving back to London. Eamon tried to persuade him to stay the night and sleep it off, but he wouldn’t have it. When he found out Eamon had hidden his car keys, he got angry.
‘I can’t tell you how that felt. Eamon gave him his keys, and we were glad to see him go. Imagine that, being pleased to see your child leave. I didn’t sleep that night, wondering if he’d got home safe, but I thought if the police hadn’t been round to tell us there’d been an accident before dawn broke, then he’d got away with it.
‘Happily, the police never came. He met Dolly shortly afterwards, and she seemed to calm him down. At least he’d listen to her when she said he shouldn’t drive. Work hard, play hard, that became his mantra. They got married, and we thought it was going to be happy ever after, especially when Bailey came along. He was such a delightful child. I still send him a card for his birthday every year, to the last address we have for Dolly, even though I know there’s little chance of it reaching him. You never know, maybe he knows we think of him and miss him.
‘Time went by, and we began to have an inkling things weren’t good in the marriage because we saw them less and less. We didn’t know for sure, though, that things were going wrong until we had a call from Tris to say they were living apart for a while. Eamon took the call, and I heard him ask if it was to do with alcohol, and Tris said there’d been an accident.’
‘What kind of accident?’
Steph sighs. ‘An accident that may not even have been an accident, though he swears it was. Somehow he hit her in the face. He says he was messing about, and maybe he was, but he was drunk, of course, and that muddies the water. Regardless, he put Dolly in hospital, ruined her hearing and her career. They divorced not long after, and that was the last we ever saw of Dolly and little Bailey, who’s grown into a man who doesn’t know his grandma and grandpa. And do you know what my greatest fear is? That you’ll do the same with Flora and remove her from our lives.’
Izzy touches Steph’s hand.
‘Never.’
Steph gives an appreciative smile. ‘Thank you. Now we come to the good part of the story, and that’s you. Soon after he first met you . . . Where did you two meet, anyway? I don’t think I ever knew.’
Izzy smiles, remembering. ‘I was trying on hats, at a vintage stall in Portobello market, and someone behind me said, Not black, it isn’t your colour. That’s the first thing he ever said to me. I turned round and there he was, and I was blown away. Tristan Hart, talking to me! I tried on a couple more hats and then he did the same, and he made me laugh. Then he asked if he could buy me coffee, and coffee became lunch. And that was it.’
‘Love at first sight,’ says Steph.
‘I don’t know about that. We both felt we had chemistry, I think.’
‘For him it was. Let me tell you how I know. A few days after he met you, he came to see us and said he’d met someone very special. Eamon went to open a bottle of wine, and Tris turned it down. For him that was unheard of, but he said he’d given up, gone cold turkey, just like that. Of course we were delighted, but very dubious. His past history gave us no reason to hope he’d stick with it. We sat in the garden a while, drinking tea, and it was as if our golden boy was back with us, at long last. When Eamon went inside, Tris took my hand. He said how sorry he was for all he’d put us through, and he told me he was never drinking again because he was going to marry you. He knew what alcohol did to him, and he couldn’t bear the thought of ever seeing anyone but his best self reflected in your eyes. Isn’t that beautiful? Those were his very words. He changed for you, Izzy. You were his saviour, and you brought out everything that was good in him. You made him the son we always hoped he’d be, a son we could be really, truly proud of, not because he was a celebrity but because he was a good, kind, decent human being. You and Flora transformed him and let him shine. For that we are so, so grateful.’ She takes Izzy’s hands. ‘With the refuge he was building, he was trying to make recompense, right his wrongs. He knew how close he’d come to being one of those men he despised, men who terrify the women they should love, men who beat women.�
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‘There but for the grace of God . . .’
‘Exactly. He came to be a big believer in karma, and second chances. He said you were his second chance, and he wasn’t going to mess it up.’
‘Thank you for telling me,’ says Izzy, ‘but I wish he had told me himself.’
‘I didn’t agree with his decision to keep it secret, but he always said that if you knew his past, you would have thought less of him. You would have doubted him.’
‘But I did doubt him. I doubted his fidelity, I doubted his love for me and Flora. I thought he was going to leave us.’
‘You had every right to doubt him when you found out he was keeping secrets. But he kept them because he wanted nothing from his past to sully your and Flora’s lives. Now you know his reasons, what will you do about the refuge?’
‘I’ll make sure it gets finished. I think that’s what he’d want.’
‘I know it is. If there’s anything we can do to help, please let us know.’
‘I will.’
‘And please, let’s still be family. We’ve lost one grandchild and a daughter-in-law. We’d be beside ourselves if we lost the pair of you too.’
Eamon is leading a giggling Flora back inside.
‘There’s no danger of that,’ says Izzy. ‘Flora loves you both, and she needs you to tell her who her father was. I want you both in our lives, for all our sakes. Especially Tris’s.’
‘Someone thinks we should have ice cream,’ calls Eamon from the kitchen, and Flora calls out, ‘Strawberry!’
‘What the lady wants, the lady gets, as far as Grandpa’s concerned,’ says Steph. ‘She wraps him round her little finger.’
‘Isn’t that what grandpas are for?’ asks Izzy. ‘And anyway, I think strawberry ice cream sounds like a brilliant idea.’
Fifty-seven
Gemma has been gone five days, and Laura has lost the ability to sleep. Every night, she lies down in the bed, closes her eyes and tries to empty her mind, to open the channels for sleep to take over. But it isn’t sleep that fills her brain but images of Gemma: Gemma crying, Gemma being shouted at by people in uniforms, Gemma cold, distressed, unable to protect herself from the vicious acts of unspeakable bullies. Worst of all, she sees Gemma finding something to make a noose, hoisting herself out of harm’s way.
When dawn comes and there’s been no call to say anything bad has happened, Laura takes it as some kind of reassurance that Gemma might be OK, and falls into fractured sleep. Eventually – not caring about the time – she gets up and sits drinking coffee in an insomniac’s haze, debating whether it’s too early to add a small whisky to the cup, listening to the hateful silence of the house into which her children used to breathe life, wondering what they’re both doing. Josh, at least, is safe with someone who loves him.
But Gemma is at the mercy of strangers.
How did it come to this?
Laura feels inclined to ignore the doorbell, being still in her dressing gown and wholly unfit for company. Aidan has gone to the bank, trying to raise by whatever means he can the funds to repay Tris’s loan. If absolutely necessary, they’ll borrow more against the house, but whatever route they take, the repayments are going to hurt. She and Aidan have agreed they’ll share the pain, that once she’s pulled herself together she’ll go back to work. What’s important is the gesture to Izzy, small recompense for the devastating blow Gemma’s inflicted.
Whoever’s come calling is persistent, and when the bell rings a second time, Laura wonders if the press have tracked them down. On the third ring, out of curiosity she wanders into the hall and opens the door a crack.
‘Laura! I knew you must be here.’
‘Hi, Philly.’
‘Can I come in? Just for a moment. I’m sure you don’t want visitors, but could you make this one exception? Only for a couple of minutes.’
Laura opens the door, and Philly steps into the hall. She’s her usual chic self – white jeans, blue linen shirt and those Italian slides Laura used to love, in the now-gone days when she cared about such things – and she’s carrying a wicker basket.
Philly closes the door behind herself and touches Laura’s arm.
‘How are you? I absolutely cannot imagine, I cannot imagine . . . Don’t bother putting the kettle on, I shan’t stay. Jerry and I just didn’t know what to do – I mean, what could we possibly do? But we wanted to make a gesture. It’s only a small thing, a silly thing, really, but I thought it couldn’t hurt.’
Reaching into the basket, she lifts a cloth to show Laura what’s inside.
‘I made you a cake. No matter how bad things get, we can always eat cake, and you have to keep your strength up. That girl needs you more now than she’s ever done.’
‘Oh, Philly.’
Philly puts down her basket and enfolds Laura in her arms, offering the comfort of a motherly embrace.
‘No tears,’ says Philly. ‘I’m not good with tears. But promise me you won’t make any hasty decisions. Sterndale is your home, Laura, and we want you to stay. Now’s not a time to be running away to be among strangers, is it?’
‘Everything’s such a mess,’ says Laura. She pulls away from Philly and wipes away tears with her dressing gown sleeve. ‘Everyone hates us.’
‘I know things look black, of course they do. And at a time like this, you’ll be needing a drinking companion, and here I am. I don’t mind what we drink – tea, or coffee, or my strong preference would be for gin – but whenever you’re ready, you know you can give me a ring. We don’t all hate you, Laura. I don’t hate you. You’re my friend.’
That evening, Philly pours gin and tonics with ice and a slice of lime, handing one to Jerry as she sits down next to him on the sofa.
Jerry doesn’t like to be interrupted while he’s reading, and he’s near the end of a Ken Follett novel of 1940s espionage. But Philly’s feeling lonely, needing companionship that’s more than physical proximity.
‘I went to see Laura earlier on.’
Jerry glances up from his book, but his eyes go straight back to the page. ‘Mmmm?’
‘She was in a terrible state, so distraught, but who wouldn’t be? I didn’t stay long. I just left her the cake.’
Jerry looks across at her. ‘What cake?’
‘I made her a coffee and walnut cake. For God’s sake, Jerry, you saw me take it out of the oven. We had a conversation about it then.’
‘Slipped my mind. Cheers.’
The crystal tumblers ring as they touch them together.
‘I hope they stay here. Sterndale can be cruel, but it can be kind, too. I’m afraid what Gemma’s done might wreck their lives, and I think it’s up to all of us to try and save them.’
Jerry puts down his book and squeezes her hand.
‘You can’t save everyone, old thing.’
‘She’ll be in prison a long time, won’t she? She’ll be an adult woman when she comes out.’
‘I suppose she will.’
‘It’s such a terrible shame, isn’t it? Just when she should have been starting out. One rash moment, and it’s all finished.’
‘People get through things, Philly. They always have done. Wounds heal, and all that. Look at us.’
Philly looks at him. ‘Are we healed, Jerry?’
Jerry gives her hand another squeeze. ‘We’re getting there, old thing. Now, can you stop interrupting while I get on with my book? I’ve only a few pages left to go.’
Fifty-eight
On the kind of day when – if life were still normal – the Ridley family would have packed a bag and headed for the nearest beach to dip toes in the sea and eat waffles on the pier, Laura, Aidan and Josh are going against the flow, driving east, inland.
Josh is silent in the back, playing on the new phone he’s been bought so they can keep in touch more easily when he’s spend
ing time at Grandma’s. Fifteen miles in, Laura has given up attempts at bright conversation or proposals for coffee stops and lunchbreaks. The reason for their journey hangs over them like a miasma, and Aidan drives in silence, responding with a shake of the head when she asks whether he’s thirsty or wants the radio on. If Josh weren’t there, she’d challenge him, because his depression is making the difficult much harder, as if he’s punishing her for something she hasn’t done.
The satnav counts down the miles, laying out the road to a small Derbyshire town Laura had never heard of, before this. She’s expecting somewhere pretty like Sterndale, but when they reach their destination, they find instead an ex-mining town struggling to drag itself from the mire of the post-industrial slump.
They turn into a suburban road of detached houses and bungalows.
‘This can’t be right, can it?’ asks Laura, and she sees from Aidan’s frown he’s wondering the same.
The road winds, and begins to look as if it’s reaching its end. Passing the last of the houses, they make a sharp turn to the left.
The secure unit is there, intimidating and formidable, fenced well above head height in dense green metal.
Whatever Laura was picturing, it wasn’t this. The unit’s website shows pictures of recreational areas and classrooms, makes promises of education and opportunities and sympathetic rehabilitation.
But this is no school. Unmistakably, this is a prison.
Aidan glances across at Laura, knowing she’ll be shocked. He parks the car, and when the engine stops, takes her hand.
Laura’s staring through the windscreen at the solid fortress wall.
‘Is she really in there?’ she whispers. ‘Is this where they’ve been keeping her?’
Aidan nods.
‘Is this where they’ll always keep her, somewhere like this?’
Aidan nods again, and Laura turns to him, closes her eyes and lowers her head on to his shoulder.
‘How will she bear it? How will we bear it?’ she asks, and the easy tears begin to fall.
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