The Winter Folly (15 page)

As she put on her coat, she felt electricity course down her shoulder and spine and knew that he was there behind her.

‘Are you leaving?’ Nicky asked. He looked different, his face suddenly a little drawn and his eyes more intense than ever. His easy smile had vanished and he seemed strained.

‘Yes, sorry,’ Laurence said through tight lips. ‘It’s late. I must get my wife home.’

Nicky shook his hand and said in a voice that was clearly meant to sound jolly, ‘I’m having a party next week at my place. I’ll send a card. Please come.’

‘Thank you, we will. And thanks too for dinner. Decent of you.’

‘It was only right. Alex’s portraits have brought me some excellent business.’ Nicky glanced at her quickly but turned away as though he was afraid to look at her too long. He
gave a brief smile in her direction. ‘Goodnight. I hope I’ll see you soon. Would you excuse me? I think I’ve seen a friend I must speak to.’

In the taxi on the way home, Laurence said in a slightly sneering tone, ‘Alex?’

‘That’s what he used to call me when we were children.’

‘Oh. How terribly sweet.’ He didn’t hide the sarcasm. ‘God knows if we’ll go to his party if it’s like that awful club. He’s spoiled, that’s all
too plain. Bet his old dad is a gibbering wreck with a son like that.’

Laurence sighed and Alexandra sensed the wave of injustice he breathed out: how was it, he seemed to be saying, that a man like Nicky was born to treat so lightly the kind of privilege that he,
Laurence, would have valued and venerated? It simply wasn’t fair.

She leaned her hot forehead against the cool glass of the taxi window, wishing only to be at home in bed, her back safely turned to Laurence, so that she could take out the events of the evening
and examine them, replay them, relive them, and feel what she had felt so powerfully in Nicky’s arms. She shivered lightly at the memory.

‘Cold?’ asked Laurence.

‘No . . . yes,’ she said. He mustn’t guess. That was the most important thing.

The next morning she had a letter delivered. Inside was a plain white card that read, ‘I must see you. Meet me in the park this afternoon by the Albert Memorial, 3.30. Telephone if you
can’t come. N.’

Present day

On Sunday afternoon John put his head round the door of the snug and said, ‘What are you up to?’

Delilah looked up from the laptop balanced precariously on her lap and smiled, glad to see him looking brighter since the disappointment that she wasn’t pregnant. ‘Just emailing my
mother,’ she said. Her family were in Wales and ever since she had moved to London in her twenties they had acted as though she had vanished into a far-off land where she could not be
reached. Apart from a couple of trips to see her, when they’d been appalled by the journey, the size of the city and the expense of being there, they’d rarely even asked to visit. Her
sisters and brother had stayed in Wales, got married and had children; they were all settled and happy where they were. When Delilah had married John, her family had seen it as the rightful
continuation of her fairytale existence, but did not expect to be included in it. If anything, the distance between them all grew even greater, although Delilah tried to bridge it with regular
correspondence and invitations to the house that were never taken up. She didn’t like it – she wanted to share all this with her family, show them another version of life they might
find interesting – but there was little she could do except keep tapping out the emails and trying to find a time when she and John could visit Wales, though it seemed impossible to get
everyone together. ‘What are you up to?’

‘Not much. I need to stretch my legs and work off some of that lunch. Shall we take Mungo for a walk?’

‘Yes, let’s,’ she said, saving her message and getting up. ‘I’d love that.’

Five minutes later they were strolling out of the house, an excited Mungo leaping up and down around them, trying to chivvy them along. He seemed to love walks with the both of them more than
solo outings. They went past the old swimming pool, which Delilah thought had a kind of lichened charm. It must have been put in some time in the thirties when its black-and-white tiles and carved
stone ornamentation had been the height of fashion. A heating system had been installed but it hadn’t worked for years according to John. The water looked inviting, sparkling and blue in the
sunshine, but Delilah knew it was icy. John plunged in every morning and swam thirty laps, emerging braced, his skin burning scarlet with cold and exertion. They went along the yew walk and then
out of the wrought gates with their stone pillars on either side, each topped with an owl.

‘I love those owls,’ Delilah said as they went.

‘Me too. They’re old friends. Guarding the gates of the house with their wise old stares.’

They went towards the woods, whistling for Mungo occasionally when he’d been lost in the undergrowth just a little too long. He always reappeared, jaunty and excited, his thick coat stuck
with burrs and twigs. Delilah picked some stems of elderflower and couldn’t help imagining a wonderful fashion shoot as they went. Perhaps a Robin Hood theme: girls in tones of green, leather
trousers, silken shirts, tiny hats. She saw them darting between trees, standing with a bow and arrow at the ready or with a hunting horn pressed to scarlet lips. Or a Greek vision of dryads and
hamadryades and nymphs of water and flowers – a little hackneyed maybe, but she could imagine Rachel bringing something extraordinary to the scene. She remembered how Rachel loved her animal
tableaux and playing with size. Perhaps she’d do a
Brambly Hedge
tribute, with the models as those delightfully milkmaid-ish mice in their striped skirts and floral puffs of
overskirt, carrying baskets bulging with giant acorns.

I miss work
, she thought with nostalgia. Perhaps it was easy to forget the endless boring meetings, the daily deluge of emails, the frustration of getting things done and the panic when
it all went wrong, and just recall the excitement and glamour and the feeling of being at the heart of things. But she would be back there next week. She felt a flutter of pleasurable anticipation.
She needed some fun for a change.

‘What are you thinking?’ John asked. He had a switch in his hand and was flicking the tops of plants as he went, taking off leaves and flower heads with it.

‘Don’t do that!’ protested Delilah. ‘You’re hurting them!’

He gave her a look and laughed. ‘Hurting them . . . you’re too sensitive. You’ll need to toughen up to live around here. You can’t be weeping over the fate of
flowers.’

‘It seems pointless to destroy them for no reason. Anyway, I was just thinking about what fun we could have doing a fashion shoot here. My mind is whirling over it.’

‘I suppose I have a lot of reasons to be grateful for the last shoot we had here, but I’m not desperate to repeat the experience.’

‘Don’t you want the house to be used more? It could bring in a real income if we made more of it. It doesn’t have to be weddings, if that’s what you’re afraid of.
There are lots of fun things we could do.’

‘The house just about supports itself,’ John said. ‘I don’t think we need all the trouble that would go with opening it up. Besides, you know what I’m like around
people. Crowds don’t bring out the best in me.’

She tried to read him. He was not being terribly positive but his face had not taken on that shut-off look that meant all discussion was at an end, so she persisted. ‘I know it would be a
big hassle, but I could take that off your shoulders. I’d like to put our own mark on the place – wouldn’t you? You wouldn’t believe how many people are interested in the
house, how many requests I get for visits and use of the grounds . . .’

‘I do believe it,’ he said shortly. ‘I’m only too well aware of it.’

‘We could attract a really glamorous crowd to a place like this. I think it could be exciting.’ They came out of the thickness of the woods into the clearing where the strange old
folly stood. She pointed over to it. ‘I mean, just look at that place – it’s falling to pieces! We could do something with that! Think what a marvellous holiday let it could be
– we could reft it as a luxurious honeymoon retreat just big enough for two, with a room on each floor. Or it could be an artist’s studio or writer’s garret.’ She felt
excitement building at all the ideas that were rushing around her brain. She could see it now as a beautiful, tiny nest, made cosy with every possible comfort.

They had stopped on the slight slope that led to the folly, and it stood black and a little imposing right ahead of them. Even in the bright sunlight, it was rather forbidding, silhouetted
against the sky. It really was in a state, practically falling over, with holes in the walls, no roof, and foliage emerging through what was left of the windows. It would take thousands to make it
habitable again. She glanced over at John. His face had darkened and his eyes had turned stormy.

‘What’s wrong?’ she asked, panicked by his expression.

‘We’re not going to do anything to that . . . thing.’

‘But why not?’ She was mystified. Couldn’t he see what wonderful things they could do? ‘We could restore it, make it useful again. It’s just rotting away
there.’

‘Good.’ He almost spat the word out. ‘As far as I’m concerned, the sooner the better. I hate the damn place. If I had my way, it would be pulled down tomorrow but bloody
English Heritage or whoever would never allow it. I’d be sued and fined or even sent to prison if I so much as touched it – so as far as I’m concerned, it can fall down on its
own.’

‘I don’t understand.’ She spread her hands at him helplessly.

‘It’s a death trap. I almost fell off it myself when I was a boy. That place is bad luck, do you understand? I don’t want you going near it! Do you promise me?’ He came
up close to her, dropping his switch on the ground and taking hold of her jacket. ‘Promise me, Delilah!’

‘All right,’ she said, stunned by the force of his reaction. ‘I won’t go near it. I had no idea you felt so strongly.’

‘Well . . .’ He let go of her, looking at his hands as though surprised by his own reaction. ‘You do now. I just don’t want you going there. It’s bad luck. It
always has been and it always will be. Stay away. Promise me.’

She looked over at the folly again. A chill crept down her back. ‘I promise.’

The mood between them was spoiled after that. John shut off from her, in that way he often did. He replied if she asked a question but only in a word or two, and he offered
nothing more but settled back into a brooding silence. She avoided the topic of the folly, though she wanted to ask him exactly what had happened there. When they got back to the house, John went
into the office and shut the door.

He’ll always do this
, she thought.
There will always be the work it takes to run this place. Whenever he needs to get away, the house will provide the perfect excuse.

On impulse, she went to the kitchen, scooped up from the larder a tin containing a fresh lemon cake that Janey had left them for the weekend, and headed out to her car. A moment later, she was
roaring away up the driveway, feeling more liberated as she saw the house disappearing in the rear-view mirror. She knew the way because John had pointed it out when they’d passed – the
small grey-stone cottage under a low, mossy tiled roof, set back from the road on the outskirts of the village.

This is ridiculous
, she told herself.
I don’t even know if he’s there.

But she didn’t turn around.

Parking on the wide kerb at the roadside, she took the cake tin and walked purposefully down the grassy driveway towards the cottage. Plump purple wisteria bunches hung prettily over the front
door. There was no answer when she knocked but just as she was about to turn away disappointed, she remembered that this was Ben’s cottage, after all, and went around to the garden. Sure
enough, there he was, digging hard among the raised vegetable beds.

‘Ben, hello!’ she called, walking towards him over the grass.

He looked up, startled, and then smiled with evident pleasure to see her. He stood up and leant on his shovel. ‘Well, hello, yourself. What are you doing here?’

She held up the cake tin. ‘Brought you something for tea! Do you fancy a cup and a piece of Janey’s lemon cake?’

‘You’re an angel in human form. I can’t think of anything I’d like more right now. Stay there – I’ll come to you.’

Five minutes later, they were sitting at the kitchen table while the kettle on the range started to heat up with a sizzle and a hiss. Ben was cooling down from his exertions
but he still had a glow of sweat on his nose and his hair was damp and rumpled.

He really is quite good-looking
, Delilah thought. She could see a resemblance to John in the shape of his eyes and the high bridge to his nose but he had such an open expression. It
occurred to her that perhaps John might have looked like this if he hadn’t had so much pain in his life.

Does Ben have a girlfriend? Surely he must. Not that it’s any of my business. I can hardly ask – it would seem very odd and nosy.

‘This is an unexpected pleasure,’ Ben said, gazing at her keenly. ‘But what brought you over on a Sunday? I thought you’d be with John.’

She felt her cheeks flush slightly. ‘Oh, he’s busy in the estate office. You know what he’s like.’

Ben said slowly, ‘Yes. I do.’

‘And I wanted to ask you something.’

‘Shoot.’ He turned his attention to the lemon cake, now on a plate, and cut two thick slices as Delilah spoke.

‘I had a letter from the pony club,’ she said. ‘They want to know if they can hold a gymkhana in the lower field.’

Ben nodded. ‘Yes, it’s an annual thing – at least it was. I know John’s not too keen on letting them use the lower field as it sometimes doubles up as a cricket pitch and
all those ponies can churn up the ground. But they could hold it over on the eastern side, if John agrees. We’ll need to give the Whitefield paddock a mow and a clear-up, but I reckon that
will do them well enough. I don’t mind setting it up.’