The Beachcomber (23 page)

Irene shook her head. She was adamant. “No court in the land would make her sell it to give you half. She was given her father’s house, and you were given mine. Out of the two of you, I’d say you got the best deal, wouldn’t you?”

“Oh, please, Mother, you’ve got to help me.” She always knew how to turn on the tears, but now, seeing that she had gone too far, Samantha was genuinely frightened. “Don’t turn me away.”

For what seemed an age, her mother stared at her. She suddenly saw how, in comparison to Kathy, this daughter was weak and useless, and in some measure she knew she must take the blame. She’d always thought Samantha was like her. She had cultivated and trained her, dreaming of only the best for her eldest child. But she had spoiled her. And Samantha had none of her own backbone.

“All right! I’ll help you, but only this once. I’ll clear the loan on the house, but I insist you come with me to a solicitor and ask if there can be some sort of agreement drawn up, to safeguard the house.”

Though she didn’t like the idea, Samantha had no option. “All right, Mother, anything you say.”

Heaving a deep sigh, Irene opened her arms. “Come here, child.”

Greatly relieved, Samantha went to her, and they hugged for a time until, stepping back, Samantha asked greedily, “When
he’s
gone, it won’t matter, will it? Because we’ll be rich, won’t we?”

Irene smiled. “
I’ll
be rich!” she reminded her. “When Richard breathes his last I’ll be worth a fortune.” She rubbed her hands together in anticipation. “After I’ve sold the business, I intend to spend like never before.” She giggled like a schoolgirl. “Who knows? I might even meet a
proper
man – one with youth and looks, who knows how to look after a lady …” She smiled slyly. “If you know what I mean?”

“So! I’m not a
proper
man, is that what you think?” While the two of them laughed at the prospect of Richard’s demise and their good fortune, he had watched from the doorway. Having overheard everything, he was white with rage; bitter with himself for having been taken in so easily.

Shocked to the core, Irene and Samantha stared at him. “No, Richard, you’ve got it all wrong!” Starting toward him, a look of innocence on her face, Irene cajoled, “I didn’t mean it like
that
.… I … just …” Now, as he put up his two hands, she stopped in her tracks. “You must know how much I love you.”

He laughed. “I
thought
I did, but I was wrong. I see you now for what you really are. I’ve known for some time how you’ve been bailing her out … squandering my hard-earned money. Well, not anymore. I might be old, but I’m not completely senile. I’ve worked too long and hard to give it all away to two scheming parasites like you.”

Clenching a fist, he shook it at them, his harsh words addressed to Irene. “From now on, I intend keeping a tight rein on every penny. If you want so much as a new pair of stockings, you’ll have to ask me. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

He pointed to Samantha who was cowering back. “As for your bone-idle offspring … she can
work
for what she wants, the same as I’ve had to do all these years.”

He gave Irene a withering stare. “For the sake of appearance, I won’t see
you
on the street. You are my wife, after all.” His voice shook with anger. “Though, God knows, any other man would have you out the door with only the shirt on your back!”

Ignoring her continuing pleas, he warned, “When I leave this house now, I intend going straight around to my solicitor.”

Horrified, Irene grasped the implications. “No, Richard. Please! Don’t do anything reckless. We need to talk. I want to explain …”

“The time for talking is over.” Smiling, he nodded. “But don’t worry, my dear. I’m not about to do anything “reckless.” In fact, I’ve already done that in marrying you.” His once-handsome features hardened. “But I’ll tell you this much: by the time I’ve finished, I’ll have my will so watertight that neither you nor your wasteful daughter will ever get your hands on a single penny. Not while I’m here on this earth, and not when I’m gone.” His smile was withering. “That much you can count on.”

As he walked out, Irene ran after him. “No, Richard … give me time to explain. You misunderstood … Richard!”

But he was already gone, and Irene was devastated.

Behind her, Samantha’s thoughts were already turning to her sister, Kathy.

K
ATHY LOVED HER
new job. Even the boss was pleasant to work with, and though he saw himself as a bit of a Romeo, she managed to keep him at bay.

“He fancies you, so he does!” The other woman who worked the desk with her was a red-haired, freckle-faced forty-year-old, an Irish lassie with an appetite for men and a way of detailing her previous flings with the same exuberance as Maggie. Her name was Rosie, and she had a laugh that would frighten horses. “I’ve seen the young rogue looking at yer arse,” she told Kathy with big eyes and a knowing wink. “I’d watch him if I were you.”

Putting her finger to her lips, Kathy managed to quieten her. “He could be listening,” she warned softly. “You’ll get us both the sack.”

Rosie laughed. “Ah, but he’ll never sack you!” she said confidently. “At least, not until he’s had his wicked way with ye.”

Kathy chuckled. “If that’s the case, I’ll be working here till I’m old and gray.”

Just then the young man in question walked by with the area manager, the two of them deep in conversation. Tall and lanky, he towered above his superior. “He’ll be kept busy today, so he will,” Rosie imparted. “That area manager is a right one. He wants everything just right, and woe betide anyone who steps out of line.”

Kathy observed the two men: the site manager, tall and lanky, with slightly stooped shoulders, and his superior, a short, stocky man with piercing eyes. “He looks like a nasty piece of work,” Kathy whispered. “I wouldn’t want to get in his bad books.”

Now, as they went out the door, the site manager turned to smile at Kathy, his small eyes crinkling until they almost disappeared into his head. As the cool September wind blew in through the open doorway, his flyaway, fair hair stood up on end, making him look as though he’d had a fright of sorts.

“Sure, he looks like one o’ the little people.” Rosie stifled the giggles until he’d gone out the door. “Ah, now, how could you be making love to a man that looks like
that?
” She fell about at the thought of it. “Sure, you’d never be able to concentrate your mind.”

As always, Rosie’s warped sense of humor had Kathy in stitches. “Rosie, you’re a wicked woman!” Kathy chided, but when Rosie started she laughed until the tears ran down her face.

For the next two hours, they were kept busy. Being Saturday lunchtime, the holidaymakers were returning their keys and settling up before making their way back home.

The first to arrive was Ray Clitheroe, a haggard, worn-out fellow in his late forties. “Another holiday over,” he groaned, “it’s back to work on Monday …!” After paying his dues, the big, homely man leaned toward Kathy. “Thank God, that’s what I say!”

“What? You mean you haven’t enjoyed staying with us?” This was Kathy’s first encounter with him. “If you need to make a complaint I can pass it on.”

Rosie’s interruption was timely. “Hello there, Ray,” she said with her best smile. “Glad to be off again, are ye? Sure, it surprises me you keep coming, when you always seem glad to get away. Anybody would think we didn’t look after ye, so they would.”

He gave a surprisingly shy grin. “Now stop the teasing,” he told her sternly. “You know very well I can only stand so much of it.”

Kathy thought it a peculiar conversation, until she heard someone outside yelling at the top of her voice, “For Gawd’s sake, Ray, get a move on. The kids are beginning to get restless.” That was his wife, a plump and shrew-like woman.

“See you next year,” he cried, rushing out through the door to six clambering children, and a torrent of abuse from his wife, who propelled him toward where the children were climbing and fighting and causing mayhem. “Sort ’em out!” Having pushed him forward, she then retired to a safe distance and lit up her fag.

“Ah, will ye look at the poor divil?” Rosie sighed. “It’s no wonder he’s glad to get back to work.”

“I bet he was good-looking when he was younger.” Kathy had observed the strong physique and those bright blue eyes that in their time must have been able to charm a woman.

“I dare say he was,” Rosie agreed. “His wife must have been goodlooking, too, before she went to seed.” Kathy looked again at the woman, with her lank brown hair and double chin, and she could see how, even now, after having had six children, there was something about her that might be described as pretty. “I think you’re right,” she said thoughtfully.

“Oh, I am!” Right or wrong, Rosie always defended the female of the species. “And don’t forget, it were
him
who got her with children one after the other. So don’t you go wasting too much sympathy there.”

The next person to return her keys was a woman of about thirty, a tarty peroxide blond, her face thick with make-up. “Sure, ye could scrape it off with a knife,” Rosie remarked as the woman went out the door. Luckily the woman didn’t hear, for if she had there would have been a stand-up scrap, as was her hot-tempered nature.

There followed a trail of caravanners, families and single folks, and couples on a dirty weekend, all leaving a small tip for the counter clerks and all vowing to come back next year.

“See them two?” Rosie gestured to a couple snogging in the doorway. “They’re both married to somebody else … having a naughty weekend away, so they are.”

Kathy was intrigued. “How do you know that?” It seemed unlikely they would tell anyone.

“Sure, they’ve been here before, when I used to clean out the caravans and chalets …” She preened herself. “That was before I got promoted to receptionist. Mind you, I had to do a bit of creeping, but I don’t mind that. You get out what you put in … if you know what I mean.” The look she gave spelled it out.

Blushing deep crimson, Kathy had to smile. “I can’t think
what
you mean,” she remarked, feigning innocence.

“Well, anyway … I were telling youse. I went off same as usual with my mop and bucket and all my cleaning paraphernalia. I usually started at number two and worked my way through to number eighteen, but on this particular day, number two had asked if I could leave it till later, on account of they wanted a lie-in. So, I started the other way round, and when I went merrily into number eighteen, thinking they’d already left for the day, I don’t mind telling you, I got the shock o’ my life, so I did!”

“Why?” Kathy was all ears. She had come to love hearing Rosie’s accounts of the things that went on in the caravan park. “What happened?”

Rosie lowered her voice. “I usually start in the bedroom and work my way out. So, as cool as ye please, I opened the door with my key and went in. I’d already heard all the grunting and groaning and never thought for a minute it were
them
… I imagined it were dogs fighting outside. Well, like I say, I opened the door, and they were that busy they never even heard me. Bold as brass, the two of them: him with his bare arse jiggling about in the air, and her spread-eagled on the bed underneath him. It’s enough to give a body the heart attack, so it is.”

By now, Kathy couldn’t tear herself away. “Whatever did you do?”

“At first I didn’t move … my eyes were glued on his arse … up and down, it went … up and down, like one of them horses on a merry-go-round. Then, just as I stepped backward, the floor creaked and he swung round.” She laughed out loud. “Jesus, Mary and Joseph! Sure, you’ve never seen a sight like it in all your life!”

Kathy had conjured up the most vivid of images in her mind. “Then what?”

“Well, he looked shocked and so did she, then he laughed and said, ‘Bloody hell, woman! For a minute I thought it were the wife!’ He then pointed to the woman who was wriggling to get out from under. “Worse still, it could have been her husband, and you wouldn’t want to mess with
him
, I can tell you.”

“And did you leave then?” Kathy’s face was hot with embarrassment. She hoped she would never be put in such a predicament.

“Well, I was about to … I mean, I apologized and groveled and said I didn’t realise, and he told me not to worry, but could I please go away and give them time to finish what they’d started.”