The Loner (31 page)

Drugged by morphia, and with the light in her eyes growing dim, she whispered feebly to Dave, ‘Remember the summerhouse …’ Aware that she was dying, Lucy wanted him to know she was glad to have died a woman –
his
woman – body and soul.

‘Daddy, I’m going to be with Mummy now,’ she promised. ‘Look after Maggie, won’t you? And don’t be unhappy. I love you and Dave so much.’

And then came the alteration in her face, and they knew that the Angel of Death was there at the bedside with them. As her father cried out,
‘No! Dear God, no!’
she took her last breath and was gone from them.

In that last poignant moment, she smiled on Dave with such profound love, that as long as he lived, he would never forget.

After the burial, when no one remained but Frank and Dave, with Maggie standing back, her face swollen from crying, the two men stood in silence at the graveside. ‘Why?’ Frank was sobbing. ‘Why my Lucy? What evil thing did I ever do, for her to betaken fromme like that?’

In his own grief, Dave comforted him; he told him it was not his fault, that Seamus was the evil one, but that Lucy would not rest in peace, if her daddy continued to blame himself.

The profound words he spoke to Frank seemed to calm that good man, who had not slept nor eaten properly since the night he had lost his beloved daughter.

Quietly, Frank put his hand on Dave’s shoulder. ‘If it isn’t my fault, then neither is it yours.’ Head bowed, he walked away.

‘He’s right.’ Maggie stepped forward. ‘What happened was because of one man, so riddled with hatred and evil, that no one could have known the out come.’

Dave slowly shook his head. ‘I will always wonder if there was something else I could have done to prevent what happened.’ Like Frank, he looked for the blame in himself. Had his secret doubts in some way influenced Fate? For here he was – free. A terrible sob rose in his throat, for Lucy, for his mother – for the tragic waste of it all.

Maggie walked back home with him. ‘Frank’s talking about moving away – says he can’t bear to stay here, now she’s gone.’

Dave was surprised. ‘But Lucy was so happy here,’ he said huskily, wiping his eyes. ‘And there are so many memories to help him through.’

‘And what about you?’ she asked. ‘What will you do?’

Dave had given it no thought; the only task he had been concentrating on was seeing Lucy to her last rest. But Maggie had focused his mind. ‘I don’t know,’ he answered sombrely. ‘I think I can understand why Frank wants to move away, because if either of us were to stay, how could we take a single step and not be seeing her everywhere we look?’ His voice broke. ‘It’s so cruel, Maggie. She was so young and vibrant, and so excited about our future together.’

He looked her in the eye. ‘When it happened with my mother, I felt the same as I do now. Even though I loved my grandad, I couldn’t go back. Mam was there, d’you see? And yet she wasn’t there.’

Maggie understood his pain. ‘If you really feel like that, then I think you should leave this place. You’re still a young man, with a life before you. We must none ofus make our life amongst the dead.’

She opened her heart to him. ‘When I lost my darling Ted, I carried on living with him, in my mind and my heart, and in everything I did or planned to do. I know now, that I was wrong. I will always remember him, and I will always love him. But he’s gone and I’m still here, and he would want me to have a life of my own.’ She smiled fondly. ‘If it hadn’t been for Frank offering me the cottage and work in his house, I think I would have just withered away.’

Catching Dave by the arm, she slowed him to a stop, her tearful eyes uplifted to his. ‘Do you understand what I’m trying to say?’

Dave did, and he told her so. ‘But if Frank leaves here, what will you do?’ he asked worriedly. ‘Where will you go?’

Maggie’s smile was radiant. ‘I’ll go with him,’ she answered. ‘He’s asked me to marry him, and I said yes. Oh, it isn’t the same kind oflove I felt for Ted … no one can ever fill that place in my heart. But it’s a kind of love all the same, quiet and good, and it gives me a feeling of belonging.’

She paused, before adding knowingly, ‘I suspect it’s the same kind oflove you felt for Lucy, while she felt for you the same way I felt for my Ted. You see, Dave, there are many levels of love, and it doesn’t make the loving any more or less … just different.’

They were at the gates now, and unable to hold the grief in any longer, Dave leaned against the gate-post, put his hands over his face and sobbed until he thought his heart would break. ‘I wanted so much to love her back the way she loved me,’ he said brokenly, ‘but I couldn’t, and I didn’t know why. But I did love her, so much … I needed to protect her and be with her. I would have given my life for her, the way she gave her life for me.’

‘She always knew that,’ Maggie promised. ‘And she was content.’

He looked up at this kind, wise woman and in his agony he asked, ‘Why could I not love her back, the same way she loved me?’

Maggie knew; she had known for sometime. ‘Because you had already given that deeper part of your heart to another. Someone you knew as well as you know yourself,’ she went on. ‘Someone who helped you through the worst time of your childhood.’

She saw the truth beginning to dawn in his face. ‘Yes – Judy.’ She echoed his thoughts. ‘She’s the one I’m talking about. She’s the one who came to your mind just now. I knew, as soon as you spoke her name, from the light in your eyes, thewarmth in your voice. Without you ever realising, and long before you ever met dear Lucy, it was Judy who crept deep into your heart and soul.’

While Dave was shaking his head, still unable to grasp the truth of what she was saying, Maggie whispered in his ear, ‘Go to her now, love,’ she urged. ‘Go backhome to your Judy. She’ll know how to bring you through this painful time.’

Before he could answer, to tell her that he wasn’t ready, that he had so much grieving to do before he could even consider her suggestion, Maggie kissed him tenderly on the face. ‘It’s where you belong,’ she told him. ‘Live, Dave – grasp your life and live it! Lucy would have wanted it so – and you know in your heart that is true.’

With the tip of her thumb she wiped away his tears, and went to where Frank was waiting for her.

One last, encouraging glance back, and she was gone.

Lenny had to pinch himself. In two days’ time, at eleven o’clock on Saturday, would they really walk out of St Peter’s Church as man and wife?

He recalled the harshness of his childhood, and the times when he felt as though he was the loneliest person on earth. And then there was Judy, whom he saw as his future. He had lost count of the times he had asked her to be his wife, and the many times she had refused. ‘Davie’ … it was always ‘Davie’.

But now, at long last, he had persuaded her that Davie Adams was gone for ever.

Kissing her long and hard, he thanked his lucky stars for the day when Judy Makepeace had finally relented and promised to marry him.

‘Hey, you two!’ Annie’s heart weighed heavy at the sight of them kissing. Like everyone else, she knew why Lenny had left home in a hurry. Because of her own circumstances she, better than anyone, had an inkling of what he must have gone through, and how lonely he must have felt; and she loved him more than ever. ‘Stop that, or you’ll frighten the fish away!’ she called when they carried on kissing.

Annie’s light-hearted banter disguised her darker feelings. It wasn’t just her friends’ imminent wedding that troubled her; though seeing Lenny every day at the shop and being close to him in the delivery van, there were times when her love for him was almost unbearable.

But no. It wasn’t just the thought of their wedding that haunted her. There was something else, some terrible secret that she still had not been able to confide to anyone. And the longer it went on, the more afraid she became.

Sometimes, God forgive her … there was murder in her heart.

Judy released herself from Lenny’s arms with a smile. ‘Got to go,’ she told him. ‘The dresses are due to be delivered this afternoon and me and Annie need to go into town for the final fitting.’

‘Our mams are meeting us there,’ Annie groaned, ‘- and if we keep them waiting, they’ll go off shopping and it’ll be months before they surface.’

‘Don’t you believe it,’ Judy joked. ‘They’ll be at the shop now, fussing and fretting, and giving the dressmaker what for. By the time we get there they’ll have her so agitated, we’ll end up with pinpricks from head to foot.’

Judy was right. As they went into the dressmaker’s establishment, Annie’s mother, Evie Needham, pounced on her daughter. ‘Where the devil have you been?’ This little woman could never understand how she had given birth to such a big, robust girl as Annie; though apart from the disturbingly quiet moods Annie often fell into, she would not want to change a single thing about her darling, spirited daughter.

‘We’ve been to the canal,’ Annie explained. ‘I hope you haven’t been upsetting anyone?’ She gave a sly little glance at the assistant, who was wringing her hands together while calling the dressmaker from the back room.

Evie bridled. ‘Upset anyone? What a cheek! Now, why would we want to do that?’

Judy’s mother, Beth, had been on the far side of the shop, admiring a pair of blue lace curtains, which would look perfect at her bedroom window.

‘I’ll have you know, we’ve been on our best behaviour,’ she declared with a smile as she came to give each of the girls a hug. ‘We were beginning to get a bit worried, though. Still, you’re here now, so happen we can get on, eh?’

‘That’s right,’ Evie chipped in. ‘There’s a jumble-sale on at the Town Hall and we’d like to have a mooch about and find some bargains, isn’t that so, Beth?’

‘It would be nice,’ Beth admitted, ‘but we won’t desert you, have no fear.’

The dressmaker emerged carrying two dresses; one midnight blue to complement Annie’s strong nature, the other a melody of lace, cream silk and white.

The two women gasped with admiration. ‘Ooh!’ Evie shook her head. ‘I’ve never seen anything so lovely.’ As the dresses floated by, she stroked each in turn. ‘Lovely!’ she kept saying. ‘Just gorgeous.’

Her own wedding had been a simple, hurried affair. Pregnant with her eldest child, Philip, it was a matter of getting a ring on her finger before her belly swelled for the world to see; though when he arrived five months later, there was no hiding the truth.

Beth was more intent on watching her daughter’s reaction when she saw the wedding dress, and not for the first time, felt a sense of anxiety. She knew Judy too well to be fooled by the girl’s quick smile of pleasure: it was no more than skin-deep. With only a few days to go until she made her vows, Judy should have been bubbling over with happiness. Yet underneath that layer of pretence, obvious only to her mother, Judy was far too quiet, too thoughtful. And before the day was out, Beth vowed to get to the bottom of it.