Puppies Are For Life (23 page)

‘You do want her back, Dad, don’t you?’ He hadn’t said anything for so long, Katy was getting worried that he actually might not. But when she looked into his eyes, she knew.

‘Of course I do,’ he managed thickly. ‘I miss her every minute of the day.’

‘Christmas should be abolished,’ Harvey complained, staggering from the car under a weight of mosaic materials. They had been stuck in traffic on their way back from a supplier in Fulham for well over an hour and a half.

‘All in a good cause,’ Susannah was quick to remind him. ‘Have to keep the customers happy.’

‘We certainly do.’ Harvey waited for her to find the door key, and when she had located it and was putting it up to the keyhole he put a hand on her arm. ‘Are
you
happy?’ he asked her in a suddenly serious tone.

‘O-of course!’ She fumbled with the lock. ‘Haven’t I good reason to be? I’ve got an order list as long as my arm, thanks to you.’ She smiled up at him, forcing the doubts about what she was doing
to the perimeters of consciousness. ‘And I’ve got the best possible assistant into the bargain.’

Certainly, on the surface, everything was going well. The car-boot sale had gone better than either of them had expected. They had sold all Uncle Bert’s household items except for an old-fashioned electric iron with a frayed flex and no thermostat, and there had been a lot of interest in the few pieces of mosaic work that Susannah had managed to complete, over and above her Upper Heyford orders. Harvey had been able to slap a
SOLD
notice on each piece within the first hour of their arrival, and while the items waited for their purchasers to take them to their cars, new orders had come in in a steady flow. By the time they had packed up their trestle table for the day, Susannah had begun to wonder how she could get through all the work involved.

‘I’m going to have to find someone to do some of the carpentry for me,’ she now said absently, pushing open the front door. She stopped suddenly on the doormat, reminded of how she had once turned down Paul’s unwanted assistance.
Perverse and foolish
, she silently chided herself; she had wanted to do things her way and on her own, or not at all. Why had she been so stubborn? And why couldn’t she put Paul out of her mind? The enormity of what she had done, and was doing, kept coming home to her in great waves of incredulity, almost knocking her off her feet.

‘Let the dog see the rabbit,’ Harvey said behind
her. He was carrying a box of tesserae. ‘You look as if you were miles away.’

‘Oh … just feeling a little snowed under. I need to work a lot faster, you know.’

‘Hmm. And I suppose I’m not helping a lot, am I?’ He gave her a mischievous grin. Having rediscovered his sexual powers he was keen to keep her in bed with him when she should really have been working.

‘Look.’ he added quickly, ‘I’ll leave you alone for a couple of days – take the finished stuff down to Upper Heyford. Mrs Tittle-Tattle will be hankering for her plant stands, you know. I think she wanted one of them to take down to her daughter in Cornwall soon. Can’t disappoint our clientèle.’

‘No … can’t do that, can we?’ While he was busying himself with the rest of the parcels Susannah studied his face. Was there a hidden agenda here? Did he really want to get back to Julia, before she grew suspicious? Because, for all his laid-back attitude, she hadn’t totally believed him when he claimed to be a free agent. How could he be when he hadn’t even discussed things with his wife?

She didn’t know what to make of him. After years of living with the dependable, if a little dull, Paul, she was finding the experience of Harvey – exciting but unpredictable as he was – somewhat mystifying, not to say unnerving.

‘Well,’ she said eventually, ‘it would certainly save me a trip.’

‘Unless, of course, you want to drop in on your folks? Those of them that are left, I mean?’

‘No – er – well, I’m not sure. I don’t think I can face them just yet.’

Harvey glanced at her, frowning. ‘You’ve no reason to feel ashamed, you know. You’re not doing anything wrong.’

‘No,’ she agreed readily, but there was a question mark in her tone. What, she wondered, would Harvey consider wrong behaviour, if what they were doing was not?

She said no more on that subject, though, because she had discovered that Harvey could argue his way round anything; and later that day, having fed her a large helping of what he claimed to be his speciality – chicken tetrazzini – he took her Upper Heyford consignment out to his car and screeched off down the road, breezily waving through the window until he was gone from her sight.

But turning back into the house she discovered that one of the plant stands was still there, languishing behind the front door.

Harvey didn’t know what to expect when he got home. Cruising in the outside lane of the motorway at a steady eighty miles an hour he pondered his arrival. Would Julia be there? He still wasn’t sure whether she had been telling him the truth about going to see her mother. He had wanted to believe she was lying to him – and yet it was also the last thing he really wanted to believe. Talk about confused; he was as mixed up as the bag of string-ends his mother used to keep on a nail in the cupboard under the stairs.

Once, when bundled by sisters grown weary of his antics into that cobwebby cave full of dusters, floor polish and brushes, he had tried to untangle the string and make a decent length of it. It had been his tearful intention to hang himself from the light fitting – an act designed to serve the girls right for their gross ill-treatment of him. Fortunately he had not succeeded.

And he was no more successful now in untangling his mixed emotions. He no longer felt the need to punish Julia, and could hardly recall the
feelings that had seemed to make it necessary for him to do so. Of course this sex thing had had a lot to do with it, but now that he was well and truly over all that he could see things for what they were. It had never been Julia’s fault that he’d lost his sex-drive, any more than it had been anybody else’s – unless you could blame the prime minister, which would be stretching things a bit far – and yet in his mind he’d put the blame on her. But now he could no longer do so; nor could he blame her for looking for comfort elsewhere. If, indeed, she had. As Susannah had been quick to point out, he had nothing substantial to go on where Julia’s behaviour was concerned; he had been all too quick to jump to conclusions – ones that suited him.

And now there was Susannah to consider. He didn’t want to hurt Susannah and he didn’t want to hurt Julia either. His trouble was, that in spite of his upbringing – or maybe because of it, because his sisters, on the whole, had showered him with love – he simply adored all women.

When he finally arrived home Julia was there. She was getting up from the tapestry pouffe on which she’d been sitting, stuffing a man-size tissue up her sleeve.

Harvey stopped, appalled; he so rarely saw Julia cry. She had always kept tears from him, knowing how difficult he found it to handle them. Even during those years when they’d hoped for children and been disappointed month after interminable
month, she had concealed the wet part of her grief from his sight.

For a moment it crossed his mind that her lover had jilted her, but then he spotted a gigantic cake sitting on the breakfast bar and knew at once that she’d genuinely been to see her mother. No one else made fourteen-inch slabs of dense, impossibly yellow sponge cake, filled with a whole pot of home-made jam and lavishly trowelled all over in pink frosting with blobby rosettes on top. They’d probably be shot if they did.

‘Well, what happened?’ Julia asked him, snorting the thickness from her voice. ‘Did you get it?’

‘Get …?’ Harvey was at a loss.

‘The paper-boy said you’d gone to London. For an interview, I assumed he meant. Not that he said anything about an interview, but I couldn’t think what else you could have gone for.’

‘Oh –’ Harvey thought quickly; he recalled bumping into the paper-boy and asking him to stop shoving things through the door until further notice. ‘Oh, the job you mean. Well, I don’t know if I got it yet. My, but they put you through it on those assessment-type interviews these days. I’m absolutely shattered, believe me.’ He slumped into an armchair and contrived to look suitably stressed.

‘At least you get interviews,’ Julia said. She took a letter from behind the bronze horse on top of the bureau where such things were usually kept. ‘Here, you’ve got another one.’

Harvey stared at the long white envelope she
was holding out to him; this was the first real reply he’d had. Was someone actually prepared to consider him? But Julia had already opened the letter; presumably she knew what she was talking about. And he wanted to whoop and dance and twirl her off the floor, but he checked himself just in time: it wouldn’t do to appear too ecstatic about an interview when he was supposed to have just come from one.

He scanned the letter three times and contented himself with a grin. ‘Things are looking up, aren’t they? This is for a consultancy – did you see? – just what I was looking for. The money should be good.’

It seemed the wrong thing to say. Julia’s face had crumpled as he spoke and now she was turning away. Out came the tissue again and she began to mop at her nose.

Harvey scratched the back of his head, disconcerted again. She couldn’t possibly know what he’d really been doing these past few days. Could she? But no, if she did then she wouldn’t be snivelling; by now he would be drenched in vitriol. Julia, in a paddy, could breathe fire. No, it had to be something else. Not him; not her lover. So what?

Then he suddenly twigged, or thought he did.

‘Oh,’ he said solemnly, crouching down beside her. ‘I think I understand after all.’

‘What?’ Julia blinked through her tears at him. ‘What do you think you know? I don’t think you’ve got a clue.’

‘Oh yes, I have.’ He gently put his arm round
her shoulders, feeling her sorrow as his own. She had tried so hard to keep it a secret from him, no doubt wanting to spring her achievement as a surprise. Only now she couldn’t. ‘I suppose you’ve failed your exams, haven’t you? Well, it isn’t the end of the world. You can always take them again sometime. Lots of people do.’

Julia stared at him from behind her tissue with something akin to contempt. ‘I’m not due to take any exams until June next year. And what do you know about it anyway? I never let on what I was doing. Oh, you –’ she threw his arm off her shoulders – ‘you’re such a little know-all, aren’t you? Why didn’t you tell me you knew?’

‘Well, why didn’t you tell me what you were up to? I only found out by chance. I discovered one of your books lying around; it was tucked inside something else.’

‘I didn’t want you to know about it,’ she sniffed, ‘not till there was something to tell.’ She slid off the pouffe on to her knees and began to poke the stove, jabbing ferociously at the charred wood and sending sparks all over the hearth.

‘I still don’t understand why,’ Harvey said, watching her. He seemed to be seeing her properly for the first time in many years, and was finding her more mature, more sensible than the inner picture of her that he was used to carrying around. And the idea of her having an affair with the man he’d seen her with at the college had somehow become remote. ‘I mean, were you doing it because
I’d lost my job? Did you think you might have to be the breadwinner and get more qualified work? Or what?’

‘I started long before you were made redundant,’ she scoffed at him. ‘I’ve been doing it for over a year.’ Then, her cheeks glowing red from the fire, she looked up and flung at him, ‘I did it because of you, Harvey! You think I’m so stupid, don’t you? Well, I wanted to prove I wasn’t. I got fed up with you treating me like some kind of pet poodle. Like some spoilt little kid!’

‘Julia! I didn’t. Did I?’

‘Can’t you see I’m a grown woman now? And that I do have a brain in my head? How do you think I manage to do hairdressing and yoga and all the other things I teach? I’ve had to learn how to do them, that’s how. Oh, I know they don’t count for much in your book – only brainy things count with you. Only degrees and diplomas and certificates. Well, that’s what I’ve been trying to –’ she gulped hard – ‘get!’ But the gulp didn’t help her struggle for composure, and she broke down in tears once more.

Harvey ventured to put his arm back. He was more touched than he could say – and riddled with barrow-loads of guilt. Julia had been doing something to bridge the gulf that the years had widened between them, whereas he – well, what had he done? Not a lot. Worse, when things had gone really wrong he had turned to another woman, led her astray and probably mucked up
her
marriage
for ever and a day, instead of facing up to things at home. God, what a mess.

‘But,’ he said, stroking Julia’s hair while she sobbed into his shoulder, ‘if you haven’t even taken the exams yet, what are you crying about? Have they asked you to drop out of the course, or something?’

Julia broke away and thumped him on the chest with her fists. ‘There you go. What did I say? You think I’m useless, don’t you? You don’t think I can do it at all.’

‘No, of course not. Sorry. That’s not – well, what then?’

Julia adopted a prim expression. ‘As a matter of fact, my tutors say I’m doing very well. They think I’ll get through the exams OK. They don’t see why I shouldn’t even start a foundation course next year. But –’ her composure broke down once more – ‘I can’t. I ca-a-a-an’t!’ She fell against Harvey then, sobbing over the frustration of it all.

‘But
why
not?’ Harvey was growing exasperated. He almost shook her as he prised her from him, wanting to get some sense out of her. He held her firmly at arm’s length. ‘Get a hold of yourself, Julia. This is ridiculous. You’re not telling me anything at all. How can I help you if I don’t know what the matter is?’

Julia gulped and swallowed twice. She was making a desperate effort. ‘I can’t carry on,’ she wailed, ‘because I’ve gone and got pregnant!’

Harvey let her go as though she’d contracted
bubonic plague. So he’d been right about that bloke after all. They
must
have been having an affair. He stood up and began to back away. ‘You cow!’ he said in a shaky, shocked voice. ‘You dirty … little … cow!’ He collided with the wall when he reached it.

‘What?’ Julia’s eyes flew wide open.

‘It’s no use trying to look innocent. I know what you’ve been up to.’ He jerked his head, set his jaw and admitted it. ‘I followed you to college one day.’ He sank down the wall clutching his stomach as he went. He actually felt physically sick. Sick with such a seething jealousy – because some other man had been able to impregnate his wife so easily where he had abysmally failed – that it was enough of a blow to wind him.

‘So you followed me to college.’ Julia shrugged. ‘I really don’t see … oh, wait a minute; perhaps I do. You think I’ve done this with someone else?’ She spluttered in feigned amusement, so preposterous did it all seem.

‘I saw you there with a man.’

‘Harvey, this is ridiculous. The baby’s yours and mine!’

‘Oh, please –’ he rolled his eyes. ‘Do me a favour! I’m sorry, Julia, but that simply will not wash.’ He laughed a harsh, humourless laugh, shaking his head in disbelief. ‘It may have escaped your notice but we’ve not been able to get you pregnant when we’ve been going at it like rabbits. So how the hell you expect me to believe all this when we’ve not even –’

‘It happened on August the thirtieth. I’m just over three months gone.’

Now she had his attention. The day in question had been the day before he was made redundant. And he wasn’t likely to forget it.

‘I did a test the other day,’ Julia went on in a matter-of-fact, unexcited tone. ‘I got a thingy from the chemist. I didn’t really expect anything to come of it. Well, imagine when it came out positive! I couldn’t believe my eyes. I went straight out and bought a different one – just to see if it was a mistake. But that one was positive too. I nearly fainted on the floor, I can tell you. And then I went to the doctor. And then –’ she suddenly looked away from Harvey – ‘I went to see Mum.’

Harvey fought the mounting swell of excitement that was rising up inside him, telling himself he didn’t believe a word of it, it was all lies. But supposing – lord, supposing – she was telling the absolute truth?

‘You went to see your mother?’ he repeated and, alerted by the sudden shame in her eyes, his blood began to run cold.

‘I … needed to talk it over.’ She shrank back a little from him as he took a step towards her.

‘Julia … you weren’t thinking – you couldn’t have thought – of not actually having it?’

But it was clear that she had been prepared to at least consider the possibility.

‘I’m sorry, Harvey, I know it was wicked of me, and Mum was furious that I hadn’t discussed it
with you, but I couldn’t think straight. All I wanted was to get my certificates. I knew I couldn’t get certificates with a baby; I wouldn’t have been able to cope. I’m finding it hard enough as it is. Actually ‘– she took a little breath to boost herself, but apparently it had to be said – ‘I’m still not sure I want the baby. Not after all this time. Not now you’re old, and out of work, and – everything. And if you don’t want it either … Harvey?’

Harvey had grabbed her round the waist and was laughing and sobbing and whirling her round the room. Soon she, too, was laughing and crying all over again, but with happiness this time, because he was so happy. She’d never realised before just how much having a child meant to him. And everything was going to be all right.

It was only a tiny advertisement; Katy almost missed it.

‘Crap newspaper,’ she muttered to herself, and was about to toss it aside when the word ‘staff’ caught her eye. She brought the print up to within inches of her nose, her heart beginning to thump. This might just be the answer.

Paul fell over a pair of drenched shoes when he came home that evening. Katy’s coat was drying on top of a radiator.

‘You’ve been out,’ he said in the surprised tone of a warden finding an escaped prisoner back in his cell. Although irritated by her lack of activity, in
his heart he could hardly blame her. Without a car, where could she go? There was scarcely anywhere within walking distance that could be of any interest to her, and the weather was utterly foul.