Peacock Emporium (36 page)

She stared at the girl, at the sly smile, the eyes that even then had spoken of too little respect and far too much knowledge.

The rain thrummed on the windows, and the atmosphere felt damp, loaded with intent.

Rosemary turned stiffly towards the Gothic carver chair by the rail, assessing, calculating. She glanced down at her legs, then moved slowly towards it. Grasping its arms between two gnarled hands, she hauled it backwards, dragging it across the carpet towards the wall, one painful step at a time.

It took several minutes to travel the few feet and, when she finally reached her destination, Rosemary was forced to sit down and fight off dizziness, bracing herself for the final onslaught. Fairly confident that she was ready, she stood. Then, with one hand steadying herself on the back of the chair, she gazed again at the girl who had done so much damage, who was still insulting her family. ‘You don’t deserve to be up here,’ she said, aloud.

Despite having done little in the previous ten years that was more acrobatic than stooping to fill her cat’s bowl, Rosemary, with a jut to her jaw, her face a mask of determination, lifted a thin, arthritic foot, and began, precariously, to hoist herself on to the chair.

It was almost a quarter to four when he came. She had long ago given up staring through the rivulets on the window, was at a point when even scolding herself had become meaningless. She decided to do what she had put off for weeks: sort out the cellar. The shop itself might be immaculate, but she and Jessie had got into the habit of chucking empty boxes down the stairs, shoving trays of goods, boxes of coffee into whatever space they could find. Now, however, the autumn stock was arriving, a major delivery was due the following day, and Suzanna realised that they could not work round the boxes – and the rubbish – unless they were better organised.

She had been down there almost half an hour when she heard Jessie’s exclamation of surprise, and delight, and stilled for a moment, unsure whether it was one of the other many visitors who seemed to instil in her friend such instant and vocal pleasure. But then, even against the noise of the rain, she heard his voice, halting and tonal, his laughing apology for something. She stopped and smoothed her hair, trying to quell the flutter in her chest. She thought, briefly, of the doctor’s appointment she had made earlier that morning, and closed her eyes, feeling a stab of guilt that she could associate it with his presence. Then she took a deep breath and she made her way upstairs, deliberately slowly.

‘Oh,’ she said, at the cellar door. ‘It’s you.’ She had tried, and failed, to sound surprised.

He was seated at his usual table. But instead of facing out to the window, he was looking towards the counter. Towards Jess. Towards Suzanna. His hair glittered black with rain, his eyelashes separated into starry points. He smiled, a slow, enchanting smile, wiping water from his face with a shining wet hand. ‘Hello, Suzanna Peacock.’

Vivi shepherded the dog through the back door, shaking her umbrella on to the kitchen floor, and calling him back before he made a break for the rest of the house and marked the pale carpets with footprints. ‘Oh, do come here, you ridiculous animal,’ she exclaimed. She had thought that in lace-ups and with an umbrella she was prepared for the weather, but this rain was in a different league. She was wet through. I’ll have to get changed right down to my smalls, she thought, examining her sodden clothing. I’ll put the tea on and I can be changed by the time it brews.

The rain-loaded skies had made the kitchen unnaturally dark, and she flicked on several sets of lights, waiting as they stuttered into life. She propped her umbrella against the door, filled the kettle and removed her shoes, placing them against the stove, and wondering whether she should put shoe-trees in them to stop them shrinking. Rosemary’s cat was sleeping, stretched out motionless, beside them, and Vivi placed her hand against its neck, just to check it was still alive. These days, you could never be sure. She was afraid that when it did die it might be there for several days before anyone noticed.

She pulled the teapot out of the cupboard, filled it with hot water, and left it on the tray to warm while she got out two cups and saucers. Left to herself, she would have used a mug, but Rosemary liked to do things formally even when it was just the two of them, and she was feeling generous enough to indulge her these days.

She glanced down at the kitchen diary as she pulled off her jumper and put it over the rail of the stove. Ben had a rugby-club meeting tonight: no doubt he would want to borrow her car again. There was also a reminder from Mrs Cameron that they were in need of some new rubber gloves and shower spray. Thank God for Mrs Cameron, she thought. How did I manage so long without her? How could something so simple effect such a change?

She turned back to the kettle, and began to prepare the tea. ‘Rosemary,’ she called, towards the annexe, ‘would you like a cup of tea?’

The lack of response was not unusual: often Rosemary, through deafness or obstinacy, required several summonses before she would deign to answer, and Vivi knew she had not yet been forgiven for her outburst. But after the third attempt Vivi placed the tea-tray on top of a stove lid, and knocked on the door of the annexe. ‘Rosemary?’ she said, her ear pressed to the door. Then she pushed down the handle and entered.

She wasn’t there. Having checked each room twice, Vivi stood in the hallway and tried to think where else her mother-in-law might have gone. Mrs Cameron had left, so she couldn’t be out with her. She wouldn’t be in the gardens in weather as filthy as this. ‘Rosemary?’ she called again.

It was then, above the dull rumble of the rain, that she heard the noise: a distant grunting, a shuffling, heralding some unseen effort. She waited, then turned her head better to gauge the direction from which it emanated. She looked, disbelievingly, at the ceiling and called again. ‘Rosemary?’

There was a silence that Vivi would remember for weeks afterwards, and then, as she made for the door, a muffled exclamation from somewhere upstairs, the briefest pause, and then a terrible, sickening crash, overlaid by a furious, strangulated cry.

‘I brought you something,’ Alejandro said, but he was looking down and Suzanna wasn’t sure to whom he had spoken.

‘A present?’ said Jessie, excitedly. She had perked up when he arrived: somehow he always had that effect on her.

‘Not exactly,’ he said apologetically. ‘It’s the Argentinian national drink.
Mate.
Our version of your cup of tea, if you like.’ He pulled a brightly coloured packet from inside his wet jacket and handed it to Suzanna, who was standing behind the counter. ‘It’s bitter, but I think you might like it.’

‘Mate,’
said Jess, turning the word over in her mouth.
‘La Hoja Yerba Mate,’
she read from the packet. ‘Fancy a cup of
Mate
, Suze? Milk and two sugars, is that?’

‘Not milk,’ said Alejandro, grimacing, ‘but you can add sugar. Or orange pieces. Maybe lemon, grapefruit.’

‘Shall I make a pot?’ said Suzanna.

‘No, no. Not a pot. Here.’ He walked behind the counter so that Suzanna was suddenly acutely aware of his proximity. ‘You make it in a
mate.
Like this.’ From the other side of his jacket he produced a voluptuous silver pot, like a miniature pitcher. ‘Here, let me prepare it. You can both try it and tell me what you think. I will serve you, for a change.’

‘It looks like Chinese tea,’ said Jessie, staring at the contents of the packet. ‘I don’t like Chinese tea.’

‘It looks like a pile of old leaves and twigs,’ said Suzanna.

‘I’ll make it sweet,’ said Alejandro, shaking the
yerba
mixture into the pot.

Suzanna stood back against the blackboard, unaware that today’s coffee listings were smudgily transferring themselves to her dark T-shirt. He was so close she could smell him: a mixture of soap and rainwater, and something, underneath it, that made her tense involuntarily. She felt oddly vulnerable.

‘I – I’ve got to get on with moving these boxes downstairs,’ she said, desperate to regroup. ‘Call me when it’s ready.’ She looked at Alejandro and added unnecessarily, ‘We – we’ve got loads more stock coming tomorrow. And no room. There’s just no room.’ She ran down the rickety staircase, and sat on the bottom step, cursing herself for her weakness as her heart thumped erratically against her chest.

‘You’re not usually here at this time,’ she heard Alejandro say to Jessie, his voice betraying none of the turmoil she felt. But, then, she had no idea what he felt. What am I willing to happen here? she thought, clutching her head. I’m married, for God’s sake, and here I am, throwing myself head first into another crush. Anything to avoid what’s really going on in my life.

‘Emma’s got drama club,’ said Jessie.

Suzanna could hear her feet moving on the wooden floor, see the slight give in the timbers above her as she travelled from one end of the shop to the other. ‘I thought I’d stay a bit later, seeing as how I haven’t been around much lately.’

‘Your head? It looks better.’

‘Oh, it’s fine. I’ve literally plastered myself in arnica cream. And you can’t really notice my lip if I have lipstick on . . . Look.’ There was a brief silence as, presumably, Alejandro examined Jessie’s face. Suzanna tried not to wish that it was her face on which his fingertips rested gently. She heard Jessie mutter something, and then Alejandro saying it was nothing, nothing at all.

There was a silence, during which Suzanna’s mind was blank.

‘That smells,’ said Jessie, laughing. ‘Disgusting.’

Alejandro was laughing too. ‘No, wait, wait,’ he was saying. ‘I’ll add sugar. Then you can try it.’

I’ve got to get a grip, Suzanna thought, and picked up a weighty box of Victorian photograph albums she had bought at auction. She had planned to remove the pictures and place them in individual frames, but she had failed to get round to it. She jumped as Jessie’s face appeared at the top of the stairs. ‘Are you coming up? We’re about to be poisoned.’

‘Shouldn’t we call a few of our favourite customers,’ she said lightly, ‘so that they can join us?’

‘No, no,’ said Alejandro, laughing. ‘Just you two. Please. I want you to try it.’

Suzanna ran up the stairs and noted that the rain was still plummeting down, as grey and determined as it had been all day. The shop, however, felt suddenly warm and cosy, brightly lit against the dull, damp outside, infused with unfamiliar smells. She moved towards the shelf, began to pull down cups, but Alejandro, with a touch to her arm, stayed her. ‘No,’ he said, gesturing at her to replace them. ‘That’s not how you drink this.’

Suzanna looked at him, then down at the
mate
pot, from which now emerged a silver straw, twisted like a barley sugar. ‘You sip it through this,’ he said.

‘What? All of us?’ said Jessie, staring.

‘One at a time. But, yes, through the straw.’

‘That’s a bit unhygienic’

Alejandro nodded. ‘It’s okay. I’m a trained medic’

‘You haven’t got cold sores, have you?’ said Jessie to Suzanna, laughing.

‘You know, it is a great offence to refuse to share with someone,’ said Alejandro.

Suzanna stared at the straw. ‘I don’t mind,’ she said. She held back her hair then sucked up a mouthful of the liquid. She winced – it
was
bitter. ‘It – it’s different,’ she said.

He offered her the straw again. ‘Think how coffee tasted the first time you tried it. You have to see
mate
the same way. It’s not bad, just different.’

Suzanna, her eyes on his, put her lips round it. Her hand was on the side of the pot, supporting it, or herself, she wasn’t quite sure. She stared at her fingers, so pale and smooth next to his, which were tanned and foreign and unmistakably male, shielded from the light by the dark curtain of her hair. Those hands delivered children, wiped tears from female eyes, had met birth and death and lived and worked in places a million miles from here. A hand could tell its owner’s history, she thought distantly. Her father’s were scarred and roughened from decades of manual work, and Vivi’s had aged from the sheer act of
caring.
Her own were pale and ephemeral, not weathered yet by work or humanity. Hands that had not yet lived. She took another sip of
mate
, as Jessie muttered something about needing to buy more sugar. Then she watched as his broad hand moved, just a fraction, to rest on hers.

The lightness of the previous minutes was replaced by something disturbing, something electrifying. Suzanna tried to swallow the pungent liquid, her eyes on their hands, all her senses tuned to his warm, dry palm against her skin, fighting an impulse to lay her mouth against it, press her lips to his skin.

She blinked hard, tried to regulate her thoughts. It might have been an accidental movement, she told herself. It had to have been.

She let out a long, tremulous breath, and lifted her eyes to his. They were already on her. His expression not one of amused complicity, of sexual invitation, even of ignorance, as she had half expected, but as if he was bewildered, searching for answers.

His gaze, locked on hers, sent a jolt through her that was almost painful. It made a mockery of reason, sliced through her own beliefs and excuses. I don’t know either, she wanted to protest. I don’t understand. Then, almost as if they belonged to someone else, her own fingers shifted on the pot until they were entwined with his.

She heard him swallow, and looked away to where Jess was pulling cups from the shelf, both thrilled and appalled by what she had done, unsure if she could cope with the emotion she appeared to have provoked, the weight of that small movement threatening to crash down on her.

He didn’t move his hand.

She was almost relieved when the quiet of the room was interrupted by the shrill ring of the telephone. Suzanna, taking back her hand, could not look at Alejandro. She wiped her mouth, and turned towards the phone, but Jess had got there first. She felt dizzy, disoriented, was so conscious of Alejandro’s eyes on her that at first she could not make out what the other girl was saying. And then, slowly, as her senses came back into focus, she took the receiver. ‘It’s your mum,’ said Jess, looking anxious. ‘She says your gran’s had an accident.’