Breaking the Chain (25 page)

‘Show me where it i-i-is.’ His voice was curt.

Phoebe led him upstairs to their bedroom and pulled her trunk and from under the bed. Then she opened it, rummaged
inside it and brought out the bestiary. Duncan almost snatched it from her. He turned it over and over in his hands and opened it, examining it minutely.

‘It’s all right,’ Phoebe said. ‘I’ve looked after it really well.’

Duncan shot her a furious look. ‘You shouldn’t have d-done it,’ was all he said, and still holding the bestiary he left the room.

Phoebe was taken aback. She looked down at the open trunk and at the diaries inside it. She regretted keenly the loss of one of them. Now the story was no longer complete. But there were still a dozen or so of them which she hadn’t read. What if Duncan insisted on giving them to Hope, or refused to let her read them? He was obviously pretty upset by their sudden appearance. Phoebe decided not to risk being deprived of the end of the story. She was packing an overnight bag anyway, and on impulse she put the unread diaries in the bottom of it and covered them with clothes. She would keep them with her at all times, she decided. That way, she would be sure of them. She felt quite glad that she had had to tell Duncan her secret now. She was sure he’d be quite bucked about the bestiary once he’d got over the surprise.

She turned her attention to what she should wear that day. Nothing seemed to fit her properly any more, and the clothes which were possible were not black. Phoebe sighed deeply. She knew that everybody else would look the part. They would be simply dressed but elegantly right for the occasion and she, as usual, would feel inadequate. At least Duncan wouldn’t notice her shortcomings, she thought wryly. He never noticed anything. In the end all she could find that was black was an old necklace which had belonged to her great-aunt. She would have to rely on that to lend her a suitable air of gravity. She fastened it round her neck and made a rueful face at her reflection in the mirror. Her hair was sticking out all wrong again.

The journey up to London was tense. Duncan couldn’t bring himself to speak to Phoebe. He felt wholly betrayed. She was not to be trusted, and to him that one fact negated all other points in her favour. He found it hard to concentrate upon his driving, particularly as he wasn’t used to Phoebe’s car. He
would rather have driven up in his old van, but he had been forced to admit to its unreliability lately. He found, all of a sudden, that he was bearing down too fast upon a line of cars in the middle lane and that at the same time he was being overtaken by a stream of faster cars. He was forced to brake hurriedly and too hard. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Phoebe instinctively braking too. She was bracing herself with both hands against the dashboard.

‘Watch out!’ she said urgently. ‘Look, Duncan, you’re not yourself. Why don’t you stop at the next service station and let me drive?’

‘No,’ Duncan said. Serve her right if she’s scared, he thought. Serve her bloody well right! Once in London he had difficulty several times in going in the right direction, and found himself in the wrong lane being sworn at or blasted by taxi and car horns. He glanced sideways. Phoebe was sitting rigidly, staring straight ahead with her face pale and set, saying nothing. When they finally pulled into the car park at the crematorium, she got out of the car without a word and went to join Hope, who was at the centre of a group of waiting mourners. Duncan was called over to join Conrad in another group and discovered that he would be helping to carry in his father’s coffin.

To Phoebe it was a grisly ceremony with few redeeming features. The chapel was high and dark. The service was perfunctory with virtually no mention or celebration of Peter’s life. Conrad read the only lesson in a brave unfaltering voice, and when it was time for the coffin to disappear by sliding through the marble archway to the great furnace beyond, it progressed in a series of undignified jerks as though someone had forgotten to oil the wheels. It was hard to believe that Peter was really inside that anonymous box, Phoebe thought, wiping her eyes surreptitiously.

‘Where is death’s sting? Where, Grave, thy victory? I triumph still, if Thou abide with me.’

She hadn’t thought she would cry, but the words caught in her throat as she sang and her eyes overflowed with emotion. She tried to see how Duncan was managing but he was sitting with
the other bearers and was out of sight behind a pillar. Hope was closer to her, surrounded by elderly family and friends. Phoebe watched her covertly. She looked positively regal. Black suited her and she was carrying the whole ordeal off with consummate dignity. In fact, Phoebe thought, she looks better than usual. Perhaps she’s not sorry. Knowing what Phoebe knew, it was not such an outrageous thought.

There was no sign of Fay. Phoebe had hoped against hope that she would be there, but realized that it was unlikely. Jack was too young to attend such an occasion and she would not have come on her own account out of respect for Conrad’s feelings. Her two daughters were there, sitting beside their father. Conrad looked thinner, Phoebe thought. Rick had arrived late. He looked strained too. Phoebe didn’t look forward to facing him in person. She hadn’t seen him since Poppy had taken his boys. Brendan was absent. She supposed that he must be at sea. Presumably he knew about the will. Perhaps that was why he wasn’t there. At the end, as they all filed out, Phoebe found herself next to Hereward and his children. He was wearing his usual baggy jersey and jeans. Phoebe looked round for Becky but couldn’t see her.

‘Hi, Phoebe,’ he said. ‘You’re staying with us tonight, yes?’

‘Yes, if that’s all right with you,’ Phoebe said. ‘The flat is full of ancient aunts and cousins apparently.’

‘Fine,’ Herry said. He squeezed her arm. ‘See you later then.’

Phoebe was glad to emerge into the graveyard at the back of the chapel. It was a cold grey day with spots of rain, but there was a large quince bush growing on the south wall, bearing masses of brilliant scarlet flowers which seemed defiantly cheerful in spite of its sombre surroundings. There were funeral flowers too, arranged in a block with Peter’s name at their centre and cards with messages of condolence. Phoebe walked over and pretended to inspect them, but was actually waiting for Duncan to appear. Where was he?

She had been furious with him for driving so badly on the way up. It had been almost as if he were doing it on purpose; trying to scare her. But she had felt constrained by the situation to conceal what she was really thinking. It had taken her some time before she could trust herself to speak calmly to him, and
by the time she had regained her composure he had disappeared. Phoebe hadn’t known in advance where the bearers would sit, and she had found herself propelled with the rest of the congregation right to the far side of the chapel. There she had felt isolated and dismayed at her inability to share the service close at hand with Duncan. She asked herself why they had had to have such a stupid row today of all days, and all because Duncan had been trying to please her! Sod’s law, she thought bitterly.

After a certain amount of standing about, the mourners organized themselves into cars and drove to the hotel where Conrad had arranged a buffet. Phoebe saw Duncan driving past with the blue car full of people, but he did not seem to notice her. She felt close to tears again. She accepted a lift and found herself sitting next to Purple Hat who this time was wearing a smart Black Watch tam-o’-shanter trimmed with heavy black braid. The old lady patted Phoebe’s hand encouragingly, understandably misconstruing the cause of her brimming eyes.

‘He had a good life,’ she said. ‘He probably enjoyed every minute of it.’

‘Oh,’ Phoebe said, gathering her wits, ‘yes. I’m sure he did.’

‘Are those jet?’ she asked, pointing.

‘Yes.’ Phoebe touched the cold black stones at her neck.

‘Very suitable,’ the old lady said approvingly. ‘Exactly the right thing to wear to a funeral.’ Phoebe could have hugged her.

Duncan survived the funeral service without making a spectacle of himself but when they arrived at the hotel afterwards, he found himself faced by crowds of people, most of whom seemed to feel obliged to talk sympathetically to him about his father, and it all became too much. He stuck it for five minutes and then slipped out. He didn’t feel up to facing people, so he wouldn’t. It was as simple as that.

He hadn’t seen Phoebe since they arrived at the crematorium, and for that he was grateful. He wouldn’t have known how to act or what to say to her. He could barely cope with his churned up feelings about her; they were so powerfully negative and so
final. She had deceived him and his whole family. She had lied and stolen and she was not to be trusted. No one could have any sort of a relationship with a person after they’d done that. It was out of the question, and there was an end to it. Their marriage had been a mistake right from the beginning. He had been conned into it. Well, he would be conned no further! He would make it clear that she was no longer welcome in his cottage, but first … Yes! Duncan thought, getting into the blue car and slamming the door. First I’ll rifle the place and find out what else she’s been hiding from me.

He drove aggressively, changing lanes and blaring his horn with the worst of them, and got out of London surprisingly quickly. There was not much traffic on the M4 as he drove west, nor on the M5 as he swung southwards round the north of Bristol. He got back to the cottage in record time. It was past six o’clock, too late to collect Diggory from the kennels, and the place felt empty without his bouncy welcome. It was cold and dark and there wasn’t anything much to eat. Duncan lit the stove, heated up some baked beans in a saucepan and made two bits of toast to put them on. He felt hard done by and absolutely justified in what he planned to do.

After he had eaten, he went upstairs to the bedroom and dragged Phoebe’s trunk out from under the bed. He picked out one of Nancy’s diaries and opened it at random:

All Hugh’s faults are sins of omission rather than those of commission,
Nancy had written,
but that doesn’t in my eyes make them any less serious. They’re just less obvious, so one gets less sympathy from family and friends! Men always seem to get away with that sort of failure, but a woman in the same circumstances would be pilloried for it.

Duncan threw it down in disgust. As he had supposed, it was typical navel-gazing feminist rubbish. He didn’t want to read it and he didn’t think it right that anyone else should. Nancy was dead. It was all irrelevant now.

He turned his attention to the other things in the trunk. There were bundles of letters and packets of photographs from Phoebe’s past. There was a tatty straw hat, a teddy bear and a
pair of sunglasses with one lens missing. There was even what looked like a pile of old vests! Duncan picked up the top one with clumsy fingers to cast it aside, when something solid fell out of it. It was a long cream-coloured plastic object, about the same size as a torch but with a smooth rounded blind end. Duncan had never seen one before but he realized with a shock after a few seconds what it must be. All his sexual inadequacies crowded in upon him at that moment. It was Phoebe’s fault that he felt like this! Before he met her he had known that he was entirely normal. Then she had started upon him, criticizing him, expecting miracles, obviously disappointed in his capacities, making him feel like some sort of freak, undermining his confidence. And all the time it was she who was abnormal! What was she, some sort of nymphomaniac?

Duncan threw the vibrator back into the trunk in revulsion. He had intended to destroy the diaries, but now the whole contents of the trunk disgusted him. He dragged it roughly through the door and bumped it down the stairs to the kitchen. Then he got the burnables bin from the cupboard and emptied out its contents into it. He picked up a box of matches and an opened packet of firelighters and threw them in too. Then he opened the back door and pulled the trunk out after him into the night.

It was dry outside but cold and the wind blew his first match out, so Duncan had to crouch in the middle of the paddock to shield the next one with his body. Then he stood in the darkness and watched with satisfaction as the flames took hold. The trunk burnt like a bomb. It had been made of plywood and canvas with bent wooden ribs on the outside, holding it together. Duncan had had a very similar trunk at school, and it delighted him now to see one burn. He wondered how Phoebe had come to own it. She had not been away to school. She’s not one of us, Duncan thought. I ought to have recognized that at the outset. Then he went indoors, found an unopened bottle which had belonged to his father, and drank a large quantity of whisky.

When the telephone rang later on, he was beginning to feel mellower but desperately tired. He dragged himself over to the phone and recognized Herry’s voice with mild surprise.

‘What on earth are you doing there?’ Herry asked. ‘You’re
supposed to be here. Phoebe’s got herself all upset, worrying about you.’

‘I live here,’ Duncan said. It seemed to him to be rather a clever remark and he giggled at his own wit.

‘Are you all right?’ Herry asked.

‘ ’Course I am.’

‘Phoebe says you’ve gone off with all her things in the boot of the car. She hasn’t even got a change of knickers!’

Duncan thought of the vests and their hidden, lewd contents. ‘Oh that won’t stop her,’ he said sarcastically.

‘Duncan? You’re drunk!’ Herry said. ‘But as long as you’re okay that’s what matters. I’ll tell Phoebe you’re safe at home.’

‘Tell her what you like,’ Duncan said. ‘I don’t care.’

Phoebe felt encouraged by the old lady she still thought of as Purple Hat, and newly determined not to be put down by Duncan’s indifference. She caught sight of him by the buffet in the hotel but decided that she was not going to crawl to him. If he didn’t want to acknowledge her, then she would bloody well ignore him too. She felt angry and resentful that he should let something as trivial as the discovery of the diaries and bestiary prevent the two of them from supporting each other as a couple on this difficult day. Phoebe considered it childish and unworthy of him, but her pride wouldn’t let her show it. If he didn’t need her, then she would show him that she didn’t need him either!