The Dream House (50 page)

Major Carter had confided to Kate, ‘Doctor Alton seems to take us seriously. We’ve not had all this attention before – they just fobbed your mother off with pills. I always thought this therapy stuff was so much baloney, but it makes sense the way Doctor Alton explains it. Helps you pull yourself together. And something certainly seems to be happening. Your mother’s taking an interest in things. Talks about places we went when we were courting. Do y’know, she wants me to look up our old friends Bob and Janey in Yorkshire? Haven’t seen them for years. Now she wants us all to get together. So I’ve written to them, asked them to come and stay.’

‘Good for you, Dad,’ said Kate.

Her mother was making more effort with Sam and Daisy, too.

‘I sent Grandad to get you some toys,’ Barbara said, pulling out a large box of puzzles, games and cars from a corner of the living room, and Grandad brought in a handsome-looking doll’s house he had made and a plastic garage he had acquired in a charity shop. There were even the children’s favourite biscuits to eat and chocolate-chip ice cream at tea instead of the usual tinned fruit cocktail. ‘Grandparents are meant to spoil their grandchildren,’ said Barbara. ‘Just don’t give Benjy any biscuits, Sam. He’s tubby enough already, the naughty boy.’

The greatest symbol of the change in Barbara was the fact that only one photograph of Nicola now adorned the room. It was the large studio portrait taken the winter before she died. Kate studied it with sadness. Nicola’s smile was gentle, but a twinkle danced in her eyes, betraying her love of life. Around it on the bookcase and the piano were now scattered half a dozen pictures of Daisy, Sam and Kate, a black and white wedding portrait of Desmond handsome in his officer’s uniform and Barbara a beautiful, vivacious original of her dead daughter. A snap of Aunt Maggie with her beloved tabby cat completed the family circle.

Major and Mrs Carter were coming up for a couple of days at Christmas, but this time they would stay at Paradise Cottage.

‘It’ll mean you sleeping with the children, Kate,’ Joyce warned.

‘And that will mean precious little sleep on Christmas morning.’ Kate laughed. ‘But I don’t mind. It’ll be lovely for Mum and Dad to see the kids open their stockings. Thank you so much, Joyce.’

Moving on.

And now, drowsy as she was, Kate’s thoughts drifted to Dan.

She had not seen him alone since they had had coffee together back in August, the day she had lent him the diaries. First he had gone away on holiday and then the routine of school, of the children’s weekend visits to Simon, her mother’s illness, myriad tasks, had kept Kate occupied and she was glad of the diversion.

She had bumped into Dan very occasionally, once at Seddington House with Max, and once at the adventure playground, he with Shelley, she with her children, and she found herself longing to see him. But lately, suspicion had been hardening into certainty that he was deliberately avoiding her.

Was this because he was no longer interested in her, or because he
was
interested – but was trying to avoid being hurt? Either way, whenever she thought of him, it was with a swelling tenderness like pain, as if she were repressing deep emotion.

Her feelings about Simon were still raw, but she was starting to accept that he was gone from her. And thinking about Dan was like a salve to her wounds. Was that a good thing or a bad thing? Were her feelings for Dan ‘on the rebound’? She didn’t know.

All she did know was that she was ready to move on. As she went about her business she looked for him, at the shops in Halesworth, as she drove through Seddington, whenever she went to place flowers on Agnes’s grave. He had told her back in August that he valued their friendship – so why didn’t he call?

The clock downstairs struck six, interrupting her thoughts. Immediately, the bedroom door whispered open and a little figure slipped into the room. Sam climbed onto the bed and burrowed down under the duvet, snuggling up into his mother like a warm puppy. There Joyce found them at quarter to eight, deeply asleep.

It was two days later that Dan finally rang. At first Kate could hardly speak for relief. He asked her about her mother, about the progress of Agnes’s will, then, almost casually, how the children were getting on with their new routine, and Kate, divining the true motive behind his question, let fall how matters stood between her and Simon.

After a while she waited for him to speak.

‘Are you busy next Thursday evening?’ he said.

No, she nearly said, then remembered you were supposed to pretend to men that you were busy. ‘I’ll just look at the calendar.’

‘I know it’s a bit near Christmas, but the gallery is throwing a launch party for our new exhibition. Alison Rosa – do you know her paintings?’

‘Sorry, I don’t,’ Kate confessed.

‘She has to go into hospital after Christmas, so we thought we’d have a party for her now instead. And a few of us are having dinner afterwards – it would be great if you would come.’

‘I am free Thursday, but . . .’ she watched Joyce bustle past ‘. . . I’ll need to find a babysitter.’ It crossed her mind that Joyce might feel ambivalent about babysitting for her daughter-in-law to allow her to go out with another man, then she pushed the thought away. There would be other people present; she wouldn’t be alone with him. Anyway, she could always ask Michelle.

‘Can I let you know?’

‘Yes. I hope you can come,’ said Dan softly into the phone and Kate’s heart did a little dance of joy.

When she hung up, she stood for a moment as if in a dream. As she turned, slowly, to go up to her room, it was to see Joyce standing in the entrance to the kitchen, drying a tea-cup. The woman was smiling at her, but sadly.

‘If that is who I thought it was,’ she said quietly, ‘then, yes, I will babysit for you next Thursday.’

‘Thank you,’ Kate said soberly, and watched as her mother-in-law turned her face away. At that moment she knew. She and Sam and Daisy would have to leave Joyce and Paradise Cottage as soon as she could find somewhere for them to go.

The following Thursday evening Kate dressed carefully in black velvet flared trousers, a white silk shirt with silver buttons and a little black cardigan in soft cashmere.

She wondered whether to try Agnes’s pearls, which she had hardly dared wear they seemed so precious, but in the end the locket seemed to hang at just the right length and, she thought, it added a suitably arty touch to her outfit.

‘You are pretty, Mummy,’ Daisy said solemnly, ‘and you smell lovely too,’ and as a reward for her flattery she was allowed to spray scent on Mummy’s wrists and on her own, then try some lip gloss.

When Kate slipped in through the door of the gallery, she was hit by a wall of heat and noise. She was just wondering whether she recognized anybody at all when Dan pushed his way through the crowd.

‘Hi,’ he said, kissing her gently, his warm cheek against her cold one. ‘Are you OK?’

She nodded and they smiled at one another. This was a new Dan, Kate thought with appreciation, as she took in the fact that his gold-brown mane was neatly styled and he wore a sharp suit. He took her hand and drew her into the throng. Soon, warming her fingers on a glass of mulled wine, she found herself talking to Jacqui, a lively Irishwoman with a head of ginger curls who turned out to be the girlfriend of Dan’s business partner, Grant; together they walked round to look at the exhibits.

The paintings were large, bright landscapes in oil, technically assured but the colours too harsh, unnatural, for Kate’s taste. Other people clearly thought differently, because red ‘sold’ spots already appeared by two of the larger works; and when Kate looked round for Dan, she saw him apparently haggling with a bearded man at a desk and punching figures into a calculator.

An older woman who knew Jacqui joined her and Kate, and began to talk about some local theatre project they were both involved in. Kate drifted in and out of the conversation, all the time keeping an eye on Dan. He appeared to have reached an agreement with the man with the beard, who was now filling in a form. One hand resting on the desk, Dan was fielding questions from a middle-aged couple. After a moment, he led them across to a tall thin nervous woman Jacqui had previously pointed out as the artist, Alison Rosa, before returning to the desk to conclude his sale.

Dan seemed utterly self-possessed, Kate thought. His temples were glowing slightly with perspiration, but he spoke to everyone who approached him, kept an eye on the young waitress serving canapés and tiny mince pies, and introduced loners to groups, occasionally telegraphing to Grant who was suavely working the room. Every now and then Dan would spot Kate watching him and give the very slightest of smiles.

At one point he brought the nervy Alison over to meet Kate and the two women talked about their love of the Suffolk landscape and what it was exactly that drew so many artists to the area. ‘It’s the quality of the light that attracted me,’ said Alison. ‘And the ever-changing skies. Every mood of the sky transforms the landscape.’

By nine o’clock there was only a small group of people left and it was then Kate noticed that Dan’s painting
On
e Morning at the Beginning of the World
, had been sold. When she asked him who had bought it, a smile spread across his face and he said, ‘It was through a London dealer. And he wants to show what else I’ve done.’

‘Dan, that’s fantastic. Congratulations.’ She wanted to hug him, but felt too self-conscious.

‘Shall we move across to the restaurant, folks?’ called Grant. They hastily helped the waitress collect up the few remaining glasses before Dan locked up shop.

The group for dinner turned out to be a small one – Grant and Jacqui, Alison, a woman called Deirdre who was the editor of a small but prestigious regional arts magazine, and Dan and Kate – but the restaurant was busy with Christmas bookings and they were asked to squash onto a table in a corner. Jacqui and Kate and Dan opted to share the banquette against one wall, the others sitting opposite.

They ordered their food and more wine and toasted Alison on the success of the party. She said little and her face was grey with exhaustion. It must be her illness, thought Kate, remembering that the artist was due to go into hospital.

The restaurant was stuffy, and it was while Kate was peeling off her cardigan that Dan’s eye fell on the pendant.

‘I noticed that earlier,’ he said, and Kate, who was already intensely aware of his presence close beside her, gave into the temptation to lean towards him. She lifted the locket to show him and he studied the front before turning it over in his fingers.

‘I think it’s Agnes,’ she said as he squinted at the faded photograph, and seeing the interest of the others in the party, she briefly explained the story of the lovers.

‘That’s just so sad,’ said Deirdre. ‘But beautiful. What happened to the other half, do you suppose?’

Kate shrugged. ‘Lost,’ she said.

‘Could I have a better look?’ said Dan, so Kate took off the locket and handed it to him. After studying it for a moment or two, feeling its weight in his palm, he frowned and passed it into Deirdre’s outstretched hand.

‘My guess is it’s influenced by the Arts and Crafts movement,’ she said after a moment. ‘At the end of the nineteenth century these artists wanted to get back to simple values. This is lovely, though not, perhaps, by one of the more skilled craftsmen. You can see the design is a little rough-hewn.’

The pendant was passed around the table and exclaimed over, then Dan asked to see it again. He seemed reluctant to return it but finally, wordlessly, he fastened the chain back around Kate’s neck and turned his attention to his dinner.

The conversation moved back to Alison’s exhibition and how well Dan and Grant thought the opening had gone. Then, after they had all eaten vast bowls of pasta, Grant went off in search of cigarettes, and Jacqui and Alison engaged in low-voiced conversation, Kate gathered, about Alison’s hospital treatment. Deirdre took the opportunity to ask Kate about Agnes and Seddington House.

‘I went there once when I was researching a piece,’ she said. ‘Miss Melton had some paintings I needed to see. An extraordinary treasure house. Did you say it’s all yours now? That’s incredible.’

‘I can’t quite believe it myself.’

‘What are you going to do with everything?’ asked Deirdre. ‘It’s such an Aladdin’s cave.’

‘It is,’ Kate agreed. ‘I don’t know – sell a lot of it, I suppose.’ She glanced at Dan as she said, ‘And then I would like to move in with my children as soon as I can. But we’re going to have to rent somewhere first until it’s ready.’

Kate had plucked up the courage to talk to her mother-in-law about this last weekend. Joyce was still insisting that they share Paradise Cottage with her until Seddington House was ready for them, but Kate was determined that after Christmas, she would look for somewhere for herself and the children. It was important to make the break now, to forge her own path and leave Joyce to her own life, which included rebuilding her relationship with her son.

‘I haven’t got my head round it yet, though,’ Kate told Deirdre now. ‘Nor what to do about Seddington. There’s just so much stuff, for a start, and apart from it having been Agnes’s, most of it doesn’t mean anything to me. What would I do with a nineteenth-century silver wool-holder or a stuffed pug dog or even a porcelain eye-bath? It would be like living in a museum!’

Deirdre laughed loudly.

‘Does that sound awful, Dan?’ Kate appealed to him. ‘I don’t mean to be disrespectful to Agnes, but these things were her passion, not mine.’

‘I think she would have understood that,’ Dan said. ‘It was the house itself that she wanted to pass on to you, the family home. She would want you to make it into your home, filled with your family’s things.’

‘I think so, too,’ Kate sighed. ‘But it seems so cold, so unfeeling, to send everything away.’

‘I know what could work well,’ said Jacqui, who had tuned into the conversation. ‘A people’s auction.’

‘And what might that be?’ asked Dan, draining his glass.