The Hornbeam Tree (64 page)

Elliot laughed. ‘Good flight?’ he asked.

‘Fine. A lot to talk about …’

‘But not this weekend,’ Laurie reminded them.

‘Ah, if you can keep Katie off the subject, you’ll be doing well,’ Elliot told her. ‘Anyway, I’ll see you when you get here. Katie and Michelle won’t be joining us for dinner – Michelle’s insisting Katie conserves her energy for tomorrow night, and Katie’s expending a great deal of it anyway informing Michelle of what a tyrant she is.’

‘I have to call them,’ Tom said, laughing, as Laurie rang off. ‘Do you mind?’

Laurie pressed the speed dial for him and continued to drive.

‘Hi honey,’ he said as Michelle’s voice came over the speaker. ‘I’m with Laurie, we’re on our way. How are you?’

‘We’re all fine, looking forward to seeing you.’

‘You’re not doing any of the heavy stuff?’

‘No, Elliot’s been taking care of that, and the guys from the rental company, though most of it’s still outside in the van.’

‘Did they bring everything?’

‘They forgot the floor, but it’s here now, and we added a couple of outdoor heaters, otherwise everything’s more or less ready. By the way, Molly’s totally flipped out over her new micro-system, which makes you the coolest person ever. She’ll be thanking you in person, I’m sure. We’re using it tomorrow night.’

‘What about the CDs?’ Laurie suddenly cried. ‘Has someone got the CDs? Please don’t tell me we’ve forgotten them …’

‘Elliot brought them with him,’ Michelle told her, ‘so it’s all taken care of, and Katie still doesn’t have the faintest idea what we’re planning, which is driving her nuts. She’s just threatened me with a stick if I don’t tell her, so I’ve had to send her up to bed again.’

‘How is she really?’ Tom asked.

Michelle’s tone was slightly more sober as she said, ‘She’s not doing badly. They’ve given her a syringe driver now to help with the pain, and if she were being honest I think most of the time she’d rather be in bed than on her feet. But you know Katie, come what may she’ll pull it together for
tomorrow
night. It matters too much to Molly for her not to. And actually it matters that much to her too.’

Forty-three today and Katie couldn’t remember ever feeling so happy. She lay quietly on her bed, listening to all the banging and shouting downstairs, the heavy footsteps, strange voices, drilling, sawing … Heaven only knew what they were all up to, she could hardly even begin to guess. She just knew that Molly was delighted by the way it was all proceeding, and kept popping upstairs to make sure her annoying mother wasn’t peeping out of her bedroom door like a kid trying to spot Santa. She could hear her giving orders to Elliot and Tom, or squealing with laughter, or yelling for Michelle. It was obviously all go down there, and though it exhausted Katie to imagine it, it cheered her too, because whatever it was, it was apparently going to be ‘like the best birthday ever’, Molly assured her.

Lifting Trotty in a little closer, Katie glanced at the bedside clock and snuggled deeper into the pillows. Four fifteen. Still enough time for a nap before it all began, and even as her eyes closed she was aware of how the sounds downstairs were starting to drift, moving out into the trees with the birds, across the fields and on to places beyond imagining. She heard Molly, then Tom. A tractor in the lane, a siren way in the distance. She thought of people she’d known and loved and would maybe soon see again. There was so much peace inside her and tiredness and love.

Trotty snuffled and put her head on the pillow.
Katie’s
eyes blinked open to look at her, then closed again as she sank deeper and deeper into a welcome oblivion.

The next thing she knew, Molly and Michelle were tiptoeing into the room to see if she was awake.

‘Are you ready to get up now?’ Molly whispered, coming to sit next to her.

Still bleary, Katie looked at the clock.

‘Six fifteen,’ Michelle told her, putting down a cup of tea.

Katie struggled to sit up. ‘I must have drifted off,’ she said, then smiled as she noticed Molly’s anxious little face. Catching it between her bony hands, she said, ‘What are you up to down there, Molly Kiernan? What terrible fate awaits me?’

Molly instantly started to twinkle. ‘You are so going to love it,’ she assured her. ‘It’s like, so cool and everything’s here, and you should see … Well, you will when you come down.’

‘We just have to get you ready,’ Michelle told her. ‘So drink your tea while I go and run you a bath.’

‘And I’ll do your wig,’ Molly said. ‘Oh, Elliot and Tom have got birthday presents for you, but we’ll bring them up when you’re ready, because you’ll want to wear them.’

Katie’s smile was widening. ‘What on earth …?’ she said, shaking her head.

A while later, after she’d managed to get in and out of the bath unassisted, she was back in her bedroom, wearing undies that were too loose and a petticoat that Michelle had just flourished from a box and that fitted slightly better.

‘Are you ready?’ Molly said from outside the door.

‘Ready,’ Michelle told her.

Katie looked round as Molly came in, and her mouth opened in surprise when she saw her holding up the most exquisite white floaty dress that looked as though it belonged to Napoleon’s Josephine.

‘We had it made specially,’ Molly told her. ‘It’s real silk and chiffon, nothing fake.’

Katie turned to Michelle. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve found me a husband?’ she said, actually starting to fear it.

Michelle laughed. ‘Come on,’ she said, unzipping the dress and sliding it off the hanger, ‘in you go.’

With one hand on Michelle’s shoulder Katie stepped into the beautiful silk folds, first one foot, then the other. She managed to stand quite still as Michelle and Molly drew the most elegant gown she’d ever worn up over her frail, yellowing body, holding out the small puff sleeves for her to put her arms through, then taking it on up to her shoulders where it settled in a deep scoop neck with a tiny ribbon running beneath her meagre bustline.

‘Now madam’s shoes,’ Molly said, and opening a plain blue box she produced a pair of white silk pumps.

Dazed and delighted, Katie lifted the hem of her dress and allowed Molly to put them on her.

‘I don’t know what to say,’ she laughed, as she started to sway in front of the mirror. ‘I feel like Cinderella getting ready for the ball.’

Michelle and Molly exchanged looks. ‘Hair?’ Michelle said.

Immediately Molly turned to lift the chestnut wig from its stand. She’d styled it into a faultless chignon with a diamanté hairpin holding it in place.

As they put it on her Katie couldn’t help thinking how lovely she might look were it not for her sallow and blotched complexion, but then Michelle and Molly were whipping out the make-up to smooth over the blemishes, define her eyes and frost her dry cracked lips.

‘Beautiful,’ Michelle murmured, looking at her reflection. ‘Absolutely beautiful.’

Molly was beaming. ‘You have to stay here now,’ she told her, ‘while we do a couple of other things, then we’ll be back to get you.’

Letting Molly go, Michelle hung back to ask about the syringe driver. ‘Shall I help you to put it on?’ she asked.

Katie shook her head. ‘I’ll do without it for tonight – or at least for as long as I can,’ she answered. ‘We don’t want to spoil the effect.’

After Michelle had gone Katie sat down on the edge of the bed and gently scrunched the glistening silk in her hands. To think that they’d had this marvellous dress made especially for her … It had obviously cost someone a fortune, and she could only presume that someone was Tom. She wondered what they were all up to now, for she could hear voices downstairs, the sound of footsteps, the odd blast of music then none. It was all mightily mysterious, and she was enjoying every minute, for she’d guessed what was coming
and
could hardly have loved everyone more for indulging Molly in such a ludicrously nonsensical affair.

The door opened and Laurie came in, dressed in a lovely white evening gown.

‘Oh Katie,’ Laurie murmured. ‘You look wonderful.’

‘So do you,’ Katie told her. ‘Are we having a double wedding?’

Laurie laughed. ‘Not quite,’ she responded. ‘The others are waiting downstairs, but I have something for you.’ She held out a flat, square box and watched as Katie looked at her, then at it and finally took off the lid.

‘Oh my goodness,’ Katie gasped when she saw the diamond teardrop necklace.

‘It’s from Elliot,’ Laurie told her, lifting it out and putting it on her. ‘And this,’ she added, producing another smaller box from the same jeweller, ‘is from Tom.’

Katie couldn’t raise her eyes from the box, because she knew if she did Laurie would see her silly tears, so she kept them lowered and carefully eased off the lid. Instantly another lump formed in her throat, for nestling on a cushion of black silk were two little diamond studs – the earrings that matched the necklace. She took a breath, tried to speak, then had to take another. ‘You’ll have to give me a moment,’ she said. ‘I’ve never had … never had any diamonds before.’

‘Here, let me put them on for you,’ Laurie said, taking out one of the earrings.

As she fixed it into place neither of them mentioned how Katie had confessed to regretting
that
she had no special jewellery to pass on to Molly, but both were thinking it. Katie couldn’t even begin to express how very special these diamonds were, for not only had they come from Elliot and Tom, they were also Laurie’s way of making another dream come true.

After Laurie had gone Katie turned to look at herself in the mirror and wasn’t sure whether she wanted to laugh or cry, for in truth she looked like the bride of Dracula, yet the dress, the diamonds, the hair … It was all so exquisitely beautiful, and even though she couldn’t really do them any justice, they were making her feel lovely anyway.

A few minutes later, after checking her make-up wasn’t too smudged and dabbing herself with a perfume not from Tom, she opened her bedroom door and stepped out on to the landing. To her surprise everything seemed quiet in the house, no chatter, or music, not even a footstep. As she reached the top of the stairs she saw Laurie standing at the bottom, waiting. There were other people in the kitchen too, because she could see their feet, black trousers, white gowns …

Slowly she started to descend, lifting the front of her dress with one hand, while holding the rail with the other. Her jewels glinted like stars as she moved, and the wispy sound of her breath was soft in her ears. She was almost at the bottom when Laurie nodded towards someone she couldn’t see, and a moment later the house began to fill with the impossibly romantic music of Johann Strauss the younger.

Laurie guided her into the kitchen, where everyone was dressed for a Viennese ball, even
beautiful
, darling little Molly, who’d taken this long-forgotten dream and was now, in her way, making it come true.

‘Happy birthday, Mum,’ Molly said, as Katie embraced her. ‘This is what you meant, isn’t it?’

‘It’s exactly what I meant,’ Katie assured her.

‘Well, we couldn’t like, go to Vienna, so I thought we’d make it come here.’

‘It’s wonderful,’ Katie told her. ‘Absolutely perfect,’ and looking round she felt herself filling up with emotion, because corny as it might seem to some, for as long as she could remember she’d adored this music, and had always yearned to go to a Viennese ball – and now, here she was, guest of honour at one of her very own.

‘We were going to have like, live music,’ Molly went on, ‘with a band outside under the heaters, but then we thought the neighbours might come and stare.’

‘It’s better like this,’ Katie said. ‘Just us,’ and still slightly dazed she looked at Judy and Dave, Laurie, Michelle, Tom, peculiar little Rusty … Then someone was beside her, saying, ‘May I have the pleasure of this first dance?’

It was Elliot. As though in a dream she put her hand on his arm and walked with him into the sitting room where the carpet had transformed itself into a dance floor and all the furniture had been magicked away. Later she’d find out it was all stored in the truck outside, but right now she really didn’t care, for Elliot was starting to whirl her gently round in time to the music, and then the others floated in to join them, the ladies in their exquisite white gowns and the men in their
dashing
tuxedos. This had to be a dream. How could it be anything else? And then she was laughing as she heard Molly saying to Rusty, ‘This does
not
mean you’re my boyfriend, right? Have you got that? This does not mean …’

‘Ow, you just trod on me,’ Rusty complained.

‘Well that’s your fault, you can’t dance.’

Elliot was laughing too, and, tightening his grip on her waist, he twirled her on, expertly leading her through a dance she loved above all others. Then Tom came to take over and she melded into his arms, revelling in the way he spun her round and round, so handsome and romantic, so attentive and dear. The music swept her up into its euphoric peaks, then set her down in its tantalizing lows, while her heart seemed to fill and fill with so much joy and love it was bound to overflow. Laurie brought her champagne, which she drank, then Judy brought her Viennese cakes and delicacies which she ate sparingly. She danced again with Dave and Rusty, then with Laurie and Michelle, before going back to Elliot and Tom again.

It wasn’t long before the pain was making it hard to keep smiling, but then her favourite,
Tales from the Vienna Woods
, swelled through their little ballroom, and reaching for Molly she took the lead. The floor cleared and everyone watched as they glided and twirled, gazed into each other’s eyes and became royal princesses at the grandest of all the Viennese balls.

Michelle pointed the video camera and captured it all. Tom stood beside her, his hand on the back of her neck, until easing the camera from her, he motioned for her to go and dance with them.

Seeing her coming Katie reached for her hand and pulled her into the circle. As they swayed and twirled and the music embraced them as though to enclose them in a world of their own, Katie’s eyes moved between their precious faces, and she knew that this was the real dream coming true. Molly was going to be happy with Michelle, and Michelle would love Molly as her own. It was everything she had prayed for, all that had ever really mattered. So there was nothing left for her to do now, it was all right to let go, and feeling more love than she could ever express, she put their hands together and slipped gently away to watch them carrying on the dance alone.