Facing the Light (59 page)

‘Well, not wrong exactly.' Beth sighed. ‘I suppose I can tell you, though Efe doesn't want anyone to know yet. Fiona's done a runner.'

‘Yes, I knew about that. I looked into their room and saw that her things were missing. What I don't really know is why she chose this exact moment.'

‘She found a message on Efe's phone. An obscene message from what I've heard. Did you know that Efe was cheating on her?'

‘I hadn't thought about it,' Rilla frowned. ‘But now you mention it, it seems in character. And look at this, Beth. Mother must have been in here during the night. These are the real dolls. The ones Maude made for her. The ones we were never allowed to play with. How astonishing! I wonder why she did that. She never does anything without a reason. I wonder if I dare to ask her.' She picked up the little girl doll, and looked at her and then put her back carefully, knowing Leonora would notice if she'd been moved.

Beth sat back on her heels. She took the father doll and
put him to stand at the dining room window, looking out. Rilla wondered whether she ought to say something, tell her not to touch the Ethan figure. She was just about to speak when Beth said, ‘I've had my mind changed, Rilla. These few days. I don't think we've been together for so long and at such close quarters since we were kids. I think I had a distorted opinion of him.'

Rilla looked at Beth. She could hear a slight trembling in her daughter's voice and chided herself for being a bloody fool.

‘Oh, Bethy, no. You love him, don't you? Efe. You really, really love him. I never knew. I'm so sorry. I'm always too caught up in my own things to notice. Poor darling …'

‘I
did
love him but I don't any more. Not at all, really, in the way I used to. I've been a bloody fool, honestly. I mean, even after he married Fiona, I sort of hoped. I had these fantasies, you know? That one day he'd just say
no, it's you I really love, Beth. Not Fiona at all. I've made a terrible mistake
. But he didn't, of course. And I've been so horrible to Fiona. I hated her, for no real reason except that Efe loved her. Poor thing. He might have loved her once, but he doesn't exactly seem brokenhearted, does he? More concerned with the Maude Walsh revelations than the fact that his wife has left him.'

‘Oh, Beth, it's not fair! I really wanted you to have a lovely time at this party. You deserve it.'

Beth got to her feet and smiled. ‘I intend to. Efe will never spoil anything for me ever again. I don't know why I came in here. I think I just wanted to look at the dolls to remind myself of … I'm not quite sure what I wanted to remember. Maybe that real life isn't as easily arrangeable as dolls' house life. I'm going to get ready now, I promise. But I can come in later and put your hair up. Would you like me to?'

‘Oh, darling, would you?'

‘Sure. I'll come and do it when I'm dressed.'

Beth left the room with such a light step that Rilla wondered briefly whether there was something else Beth should have told her but hadn't. She made her way to her own room and sat down at the dressing-table, thinking about Fiona. Well, she said to herself as she massaged moisturizer into her face and neck, I'll ask her when she comes to do my hair. I'd never have credited Fiona with the nerve to walk out like that. She wondered what Leonora would say. And Gwen, too, when she heard that there would be a space at the family table. Fiona's parents probably wouldn't be here either, which meant the disruption of all her careful arrangements.

Gwen, she was quite sure, had been up since dawn, but soon the corridor would be full of the excitement of everyone else getting ready for the party. There would be many different perfumes in the air. Rilla sprayed Vivienne Westwood's
Boudoir
all over her body, and was just thinking how divine it was, when someone knocked on her door.

‘Come in,' she called, and there was Gwen, dressed in a tracksuit and looking harassed. ‘What's the matter?'

‘I've just spoken to Efe, Rilla. Do you know what's happened?' Something, some instinct, told Rilla to lie. Gwen might be put out to realize that Rilla knew something about her son before she did and there was no point in asking for an argument.

‘No, Gwen … it isn't Mother, is it?'

Gwen shook her head. ‘It's Fiona. She's left him. Left Efe, I mean. I can't imagine why. He wouldn't tell me. I don't know what I'll do.'

She sat down on the edge of the bed, and took out a hankie.

‘Gwen, you're crying. Oh, please don't cry. I'm sure they'll work something out. They'll be all right. Really.'

‘What if they aren't? What if she never goes back to him?'

Rilla bit back her first thought, which was that she never realized Gwen was so devoted to Fiona, and murmured something soothing.

‘Oh God, Rilla, it's so difficult to explain!' said Gwen. ‘It's not Fiona. It's not even Efe. If he wants to risk his marriage with a whole string of sordid affairs, that's his business, but it's Douggie. I may never see him again, Rilla. I couldn't bear that. Couldn't bear it.'

She started crying again. ‘I'm so sorry, Rilla, I didn't mean to burden you like this, wailing like a banshee.'

‘Don't be silly, Gwen, you can burden me, as you put it, all you like, but I think you should stop crying. Your eyes will be red for the party and Mother'll want to know why, and you'll never hear the end of it. Besides, you
will
see Douggie. I'm sure Fiona won't keep him away from you.'

‘She's quite capable of it. I'll become one of those absent grannies. Oh, God, Rilla, that awful McVie woman will have him for Christmases and birthdays and I'll never see him.'

‘You don't know that. Even if they
were
to divorce, Efe will get good visitation rights and you can make sure he brings Douggie here whenever he has him. Efe won't want to look after Douggie on his own. He'll need you. Really he will.'

Gwen looked happier. ‘Yes, I suppose he might. Thank you for saying that. It makes me feel a bit better.'

‘And in any case,' Rilla added, ‘you don't know she's gone for ever. She might just want to give Efe a bit of a shock. She might well be back.'

‘That's true. I hadn't thought of that.' Gwen stood up. ‘I'm so glad I told you all this. Thanks so much for letting me witter on. I must go and do a repair job on my eyes.'

‘Take this,' Rilla said, and pressed a tiny tub of
concealer into her sister's hand. ‘Dab a bit of this round your eyes just before you put your powder on. Magic stuff.'

Gwen looked down at the make-up uncertainly. ‘I've never used this sort of thing before.'

‘You've not had anything to conceal up to now, I expect, but needs must,' Rilla said. ‘Go on. Spoil yourself.'

After Gwen left the room, Rilla thought how surprising everyone was. She'd never have guessed that her sister was so besotted with Douggie. Poor Gwen. For a while, she considered the chances of Fiona going back to Efe but then she thought, what the hell! Why should I worry with such things today? Time enough for discussing family troubles tomorrow. I'm going to a party, dammit. She turned her mind to the question of earrings. Dangly crystal drops or gobstopping Baroque pearls? That was the kind of problem she was willing to wrestle with.

*

Reuben Stronsky stopped the car just outside the gates of Willow Court and looked down the avenue of oaks to the house at the top of the drive. What a sensational view this is, he thought. If only the whole place was in the middle of London instead of here in the boondocks, then the possibility of turning the house into a decent museum would be a distinct possibility.

He drove up and parked the BMW in the area to one side of the house that had been set aside for cars. A discreet board with an arrow painted on it showed him the way. He remembered the very first time he'd ever come to this house, as a visitor among others, years ago now. The pictures had hit him right between the eyes and he'd been haunted by them ever since.

A young man was approaching the car.

‘Good morning, sir. We've been expecting you.'

‘Thank you. I'm rather on the early side, I'm afraid.
I'm going to walk about for a while and then it's drinks on the terrace, am I right?'

‘Yes, that's right, sir. At about eleven, I believe.'

‘I'll be there,' Reuben said. The young man disappeared in the direction of the house. Reuben got out of the car and unlocked the trunk. It was called a boot over here, which made no sense to him at all. He put the parcel under a blanket and locked up the car. He wasn't going to go up to the house clutching the present. It was important that Leonora received it without any distractions. He'd go and get it later on, when the party was over.

Reuben began to walk towards the gardens, then paused. He took out his mobile phone from a pocket in his jacket and punched in Efe's number.

‘Efe, is that you?' he said after a few moments. ‘This is Reuben. I'm in your car park right now.'

*

‘Can you remember whose birthday it is today, Miss Mussington?'

‘It isn't my birthday, is it?' Nanny Mouse frowned and tried to concentrate. She had eaten her breakfast and she was ready for the party. She knew that there would be a party but was it for one of the children? Efe, perhaps. No, that wasn't it. The effort of thinking tired her and she said, ‘It's slipped my mind for the moment, Miss Lardner. Please remind me.'

‘It's Leonora's birthday. She's seventy-five today.'

‘What nonsense! Seventy-five! Why, she can't be a day over forty.'

Nanny Mouse stroked the fabric of her dress and smiled. ‘This dress is very pretty, isn't it? I shall be the belle of the ball. That's what I used to say to Leonora whenever she went out. I used to say, you'll be the belle of the ball.'

She closed her eyes. Miss Lardner looked at her, sitting
in her wheelchair. They'd had to get up specially early to make sure to be ready in time, dressed in their best clothes. She herself was wearing her dark green summer costume, with a straw hat that she'd cheered up by the addition of some artificial cherries of quite astonishing glossiness. Miss Mussington was in her navy-blue silk. A pearl and amethyst brooch was pinned in the exact centre of the lace collar. Her hair was neat and tidy, pulled back into a bun at the nape of her neck.

‘Mr Everard is coming to pick us up in his car and take us to the house. Aren't we lucky?' She was looking forward to going up to Willow Court, which was not something they did very often. She was also more excited than she would have admitted at the thought of seeing herself on television. Mr Everard had asked her to make sure the video recorder was all ready because he had a tape of the recording he'd made of his conversation with Miss Mussington and he was going to show it to them.

‘You are in several shots, Miss Lardner,' he'd told her. ‘And looking very handsome too.'

‘Miss Mussington will be very pleased,' she'd answered. ‘We look forward to seeing you.'

*

Efe fully expected to be alone at breakfast, but to his surprise Leonora was sitting at the table in the kitchen, drinking Earl Grey tea and looking rather frail in her dark blue dressing-gown. He was used to seeing his grandmother dressed, made-up, with her pearl earrings in place and black court shoes on her feet. She's old, Efe thought. Really old. He noticed, perhaps for the first time, the wrinkles around her eyes, the blue veins standing out on the backs of her hands.

‘Happy Birthday, Leonora!' he said, and came over to give her a kiss.

‘You're the first person to say that, Efe. Thank you,
darling. I've just come down for a cup of tea before getting ready for the party. I'm rather excited.'

She smiled at Efe, and oddly, she suddenly looked not like an old woman but more like a kid. Efe hesitated. He knew he ought to tell her about Fiona, but part of him was seriously considering lying. Saying something about her still not feeling well, not in a state to go to the party. He was just about to speak when Leonora interrupted him.

‘Something's the matter, Efe, isn't it? I know it is, so there's no point looking away. And don't lie to me, please. I don't need to be protected. I've always known when you're lying.'

‘Wouldn't dream of it, Leonora. There
is
something, actually. I was going to tell you later. I didn't want to spoil the party.'

‘Tell me.'

‘It's Fiona. She's left me. That's it. She's taken Douggie and gone.'

Leonora was silent for a moment. Then she said, ‘Are you very upset, Efe? Do you want to go after her? I won't mind if that's what you feel you have to do.'

‘Certainly not! I wouldn't miss your party for the world. Besides, it's up to her to come back, not up to me to go chasing her all over the country.'

‘I'm touched, darling. But Efe,' Leonora's voice became sharper, ‘perhaps that attitude has something to do with why Fiona left in the first place? What about Douggie? Surely you want him back?'

‘I'll get him back, don't you worry,' Efe said, privately wondering how on earth he would look after Douggie on his own.

‘Anyway, thank you for telling me, Efe. I'm sorry Fiona will miss the party. She was looking forward to it, I think.'

‘More fool her, then, for going. I refuse to worry about
her today. Today is your day, Leonora. It's got to be fun from start to finish.'

‘Well. I'd better go and get my glad rags on then. As you said when you were about sixteen, I think dressing-gowns after eight o'clock in the morning are a sign of loose living. I shall see you on the terrace for drinks, then.'

‘Right,' said Efe, and when Leonora left the room, he turned his attention to his mobile phone. Getting-up noises were coming from upstairs now. That was Chloë, shouting something out as she ran along the corridor. It was a sound he recognized from their childhood – excitement, the thrill of getting ready, the sort of holding of your breath till the event that you were waiting for happened.