The Silent Tide (45 page)

‘The Fanshawes?’ Isabel asked as she fetched the cake from the pantry and loaded up the tea trolley.

That portly woman who looks after your sister.’ Penelope was looking intently at her now ‘Isabel, my dear,’ she said. ‘We have to talk. Reginald and I are on our way back, but I’ll arrange something soon. Why don’t I come down again and fetch you out for lunch one day?’

‘I’d love that,’ Isabel said. ‘When Lorna’s a little better.’

‘Bring the child with you, if you like. Sea air is good, I suppose? I’ll telephone you.’

‘Thank you,’ Isabel said, wondering what on earth her aunt wanted to tell her. ‘Did Stephen mention that we saw him there in the summer?’

‘He did, poor dear man,’ she said.

‘Why poor?’

‘His wife has left him. Her father wants the marriage annulled on the basis there are no children. Quite how that’s to be achieved I don’t know.’

Isabel thought about this and how kind Stephen had always been to her. It must be her low mood, but there seemed so much unhappiness in the world.

‘Berec was very pleased to receive your parcel. I visit him from time to time. Dear Berec. He’s entirely selfless. His greatest worry is for his friends, Gregor and Karin.’

‘Has something happened to them?’

Penelope leaned forward conspiratorially. ‘Gregor’s name has appeared on some list of political undesirables. He’s to be deported, and Karin will go with him. Berec has asked me to write to the Home Office. I will, but it won’t do any good, of course.’

Isabel remembered Gregor, his passion for justice. Surely he wasn’t dangerous, and Karin was the most gentle of women. How was it that no one was as they seemed.

Gelert had followed Penelope out to the kitchen. He nosed open the door to the pantry.

‘Oh lor, the ham,’ Isabel said, leaping up to rescue it. ‘Won’t you both stay for supper? There’s an awful lot of food.’

Penelope shook her head. ‘Reginald wants to get back to London.’ She stood up. ‘Isabel,’ she said, ‘you’re a Lewis. And our mother used to tell Pamela and me that Lewis women do not lie down and give up. You must find a way, but I can’t tell you what that way is. It’s for you to find out.’

Isabel felt at that moment that lying down and giving up was all that she could manage, but she nodded.

‘One more cup of tea,’ Penelope said, ‘and then I really think we must be going.’

That night, Lorna became very ill. Her temperature shot right up, and her eyes glittered with fever. Worst of all she began to cough, a strange tight little cough like a seal’s bark, and she couldn’t quite catch her breath. The doctor was summoned and pronounced it to be croup. A steam kettle was unearthed and Isabel spent an anxious night with Lorna in a bathroom filled with steam to ease her breathing. By the morning the worst was over, but several days and nights of careful nursing were required before the baby was declared completely out of danger. Isabel was exhausted. By the time mother and child were strong enough to travel to Kent, her mother was out of hospital – for the time being, at least. Isabel took Lorna with her, which pleased her family, but she was shocked by her mother’s appearance; Pamela was so thin and pale it seemed that light shone through her.

It was soon after her return that she plucked up courage to speak to Hugh about the matter that was upmost in her mind.

‘I don’t like her coming here, Hugh.’

‘Jacqueline? Why not?’

‘I – she tries to come between us.’

‘That’s a very unkind thing to say. I think she’s been a tremendous help. Look how much she’s done for you with Lorna, especially when you’ve been . . . unwell.’

‘She has helped, I see that, but I’m much better now and she doesn’t need to keep coming to the house.’

‘Isabel, she’s a friend, and she’s recently lost her husband. You’re surely not suggesting we drop her when it’s her turn to need us?’

‘And I’m sorry for her. But don’t you think it rather odd, that she latches on to us the way she does?’

‘That’s rubbish, Isabel.’

‘It isn’t, I’m sure it isn’t. Your mother said-’ She stopped.

Hugh folded his arms. ‘And what did my mother say? Wait, I think I can guess. She’s always had a thing about Jacqueline. Absolute nonsense, of course.’

‘But is it? I can’t feel settled about the whole thing. And I know that you’ve been seeing her in London.’

‘Seeing her? Now what can you possibly mean by that? If you mean that she’s accompanied me out to dinner occasionally, or to a party, why, yes, I’ve been seeing her. But we’re both married, or rather she was then. Someone would have to have a particularly nasty mind to make anything of it. Who is it? Tell me.’

‘It doesn’t matter. That’s not the point.’

‘It’s your aunt, isn’t it? She pretends to be so aloof, but she enjoys giving the pot a stir.’

‘That’s a horrid thing to say. She’s not like that at all.’

‘Nor is Jacqueline the person you seem to think she is. She’s always been a friend to my family, right since we were small. She’s loyal and kind and helpful, and now you’re hitting her when she’s down. It’s not very Christian of you.’

‘Hugh! I didn’t say she wasn’t any of those things. Oh, you don’t see it at all, do you? I can’t be myself when she’s here. She takes over. It makes me feel useless – useless, don’t you see? And people are talking about it. It must stop.’

‘You’re being irrational. Why does everything have to be a big drama with you? Accusing people of this and that , with not a shred of evidence. It’s wild.’

‘It is not wild, Hugh. Or irrational. It’s a feeling I have.’

‘If we all followed our feelings we’d be like animals. Listen to me. Jacqueline is closer to me than any of my relatives now that Mother’s gone. She looked after Mother, too. Such a comfort to her after my father died.’

Any of your relatives? What about me – don’t I matter?’

‘Of course you matter, you silly thing. But I’m not going to blank my friends because you have feelings about them . It’s balderdash.’

She looked at him steadily. ‘Hugh, I’m sorry that you think so little of my feelings. I am your wife, after all. And I have to ask you something. Are you having an affair with Jacqueline?’

‘How can you even ask that? Don’t you trust me at all?’

‘Just answer the question. Please, I need to know.’

‘I don’t feel I have to. That’s a monstrous accusation.’

‘Does that mean the answer’s no? Please, Hugh, it’s important.’

He opened his mouth then closed it again and looked wildly about the room. ‘I can’t see that there’s any point in continuing this conversation,’ he said. He walked about, randomly picking up clothes, his brush and comb, and putting them down again. Then he threw aside the pillow and grabbed the pyjamas lying underneath.

‘I’ll sleep in Mother’s old room tonight. It’ll give you the chance to calm down.’

‘Hugh, please.’

But he was out of the door without another word. She went after him. ‘Hugh,’ she called, ‘the bed’s not made up.’ But he ignored her, swept into his mother’s bedroom and shut the door. She went and stood outside, and was about to grasp the handle, when she heard the key turn in the lock.

‘Hugh,’ she moaned, throwing herself against the door. She gave a sob . Inside there was silence. After a while she returned to her bedroom where she fell on the bed and cried.

The sense that she’d ruined everything was overwhelming. She’d accused her husband of something of which she had no proof, only an intense suspicion. Perhaps she’d done wrong by Jacqueline, who’d been so generous with her time and energy during the last year or so. Maybe she’d ruined her marriage, irreparably. She’d hardly recognised her beloved Hugh in the hard cold man who’d berated her this evening. Perhaps he was right: she was hysterical, irrational, but she didn’t think she was. He’d been so unjust, when all she’d wanted was loving reassurance. She could not remember ever feeling so miserable. At that thought she wept some more.

In the morning, when she went downstairs carrying Lorna, he was eating breakfast alone . He smiled at Lorna but hardly looked at Isabel. ‘I’ve decided I’m going to London this afternoon,’ he told her in the chilliest of tones. ‘I think it would be best under the circumstances.’

‘Oh, Hugh, shouldn’t we talk?’ she said, unable to stop the sob in her voice.

‘I think we’ve both said enough for now. I rather favour some peace and quiet. Perhaps you’d like to think about what you’ve said.’ He finished his toast, took up his tea and shut himself into his study.

That afternoon, he left for London with only a cold ‘Goodbye’.

.

Emily

One Friday in July, Emily left for work first thing, planning to swim before getting down to the business of the day, but when she arrived at the swimming baths a notice informed her they were closed because the heating system had broken. Feeling grumpy, she consoled herself with a takeaway pot of creamy porridge from a sandwich shop. She was so early at the office that the receptionist was not yet at her desk and Emily was the only one in the lift as it juddered its way up to her floor.

When the lift door opened she was surprised to see someone waiting to get in – a small, older woman in a neatly tailored blouse and skirt. She looked startled by Emily’s appearance, but returned her ‘Good morning’ in a friendly enough tone as the lift doors closed between them. Emily wondered vaguely who she was. She’d glimpsed her once or twice before.

She went to look at her pigeonhole, but it was too early for the post. She turned and saw from the panel over the lift that it had stopped at one, indicating that the woman had got out at the floor below. That was the floor of the Reference division, she recalled. Perhaps the woman worked there. Emily wondered vaguely what she’d been doing on this floor.

She opened the door to her office and saw she was the first one in, but at once she sensed that someone else had been there. On her desk lay an envelope addressed to ‘Miss Emily Gordon’, in the same way all the other mysterious envelopes had been. She opened it, her mind still computing connections. Suddenly they all fell into place. That woman she had just seen must have left it here.

She quickly scanned the pages in Isabel’s handwriting whilst eating a couple of spoonfuls of porridge, then stuffed the pages back into the envelope and hurried with it to the door, just as Sarah came in.

‘You’re in early,’ Sarah told her.

‘Sorry,’ she gasped in reply. ‘See you later. I’ve got to catch someone.’

It might sound odd to an outsider that Emily should have worked in a company for almost a year and yet failed to have set foot on one of its floors. But her department operated completely independently from the Reference division, and she had never had any cause to visit anyone there. The first-floor landing, she found, was exactly the same as the second floor in most respects, yet it exuded a different air. There were several posters on the wall here, charts about birds and fish, but these were sad and shabby, the corners curling. Several of the ubiquitous plastic crates colonised the space under the pigeonholes, piled with old reference books no longer wanted in the bright pixelated world of the internet.

Although it was nearly nine now, the place was quiet. How to ask for someone whom she’d only glimpsed for a moment, and whose name she didn’t yet know? Still, she prowled the landing hopefully, and was soon rewarded. At the far end, hidden away behind the lift-shaft, a strip of daylight fell across the carpet, drawing her to an open door. She peeped inside but there was no one there, though the occupant had clearly been in the middle of packing books into crates. It was a small office, with a window looking out on the backs of other buildings, but someone had made it their home.

Entranced, Emily took a step inside to admire the lovely old desk, the floor lamp with its fringed shade, pretty cushions on the chairs. On a bookcase by her elbow was a series of wildlife guides, with beautifully decorated spines, that produced a tug of recognition. She put out a hand to withdraw the one which had always been her favourite. It was about creatures of the sea.

They’re first editions.’ The voice behind her was low and musical. She looked round in surprise to see a pair of brown eyes, intelligent, amused. They belonged to the woman she had seen upstairs, getting into the lift. She was neat, if plainly dressed, and her grey hair was cut into a schoolgirl bob to frame her heart-shaped face.

‘I’m sorry to intrude,’ Emily stammered, showing the book in her hand. ‘I love this series. My father owns a set. He’s always telling us how he bought them with money from his paper round when he was a boy.’

‘They’re splendid, aren’t they?’ the woman said, selecting another from the shelves and turning to a beautiful frontispiece. ‘I’m particularly proud of having published them.’

‘You did?’ These books were a part of Emily’s childhood, and here was the woman responsible for them. There was something amazing about this.

‘I was the editor, yes,’ the woman told her. ‘Quite a labour of love they were at the time, as we had such trouble with the photographs – but it was worth it in the end. They reprint year after year, you know, even now Can’t think why anyone would want one of those wretched ebooks instead. You can’t look at those on the shelf, can you?’

‘No,’ Emily said in hearty agreement. She glanced about the room. ‘What an awful business, packing up all of this must be.’

‘Yes,’ the woman said. ‘I’m finding it horribly emotional. The whole of my working life, forty-odd years’ worth, is in this room. The files and manuscripts have to go to the archives, and some of the books, but I’m allowed to keep anything they’ve already got copies of.’

‘You’re leaving then,’ Emily said, passing her the book, ‘not just moving offices?’

‘I’m leaving, yes.’ The woman gave a wistful smile. ‘I suppose it’s time. I was planning to retire anyway in the next year or two. It’s come earlier than I thought, that’s all.’

‘I don’t know your name, I’m afraid,’ Emily said, putting out her hand. ‘I’m Emily Gordon.’

‘I know who you are,’ the woman said gravely, shaking it. ‘And I know why you’ve come. I’ve been waiting.’