A Dead Man Out of Mind (15 page)

CHAPTER 11

    
And I lie even among the children of men, that are set on fire: whose teeth are spears and arrows, and their tongue a sharp sword.

Psalm 57.5

Lucy frowned, surveying her sitting room; absently she twisted a curl around her finger. Her niece would be arriving tomorrow. How on earth was she going to accommodate Ruth and all her possessions? David was right: the girl was bound to bring all sorts of things with her. And he was right, too, that the house wasn't big enough for three people.

Sleeping wasn't really a problem, with the sofa bed in the sitting room. But where would she put her things? Apart from the sitting room, the downstairs consisted of a small dining room and a good-sized, extended kitchen – but that was no help. Upstairs was a tiny bathroom, the bedroom and Lucy's studio. Perfect for one person, workable – just – for two, but three was stretching the house beyond its limits.

Ruth was only part of the problem, of course, Lucy realised. The other person in the equation was David. Whatever happened, Lucy didn't want him to feel surplus to requirements, or unwelcome in her house. For the first time she acknowledged to herself that she now thought of it as
their
house, hers and David's. She loved having him there, loved sharing her life with him. While she was working in her studio during the day, it was wonderful to be able to look forward to his return home, and a shared evening of good food and conversation. Not to mention what followed: she enjoyed the luxury of sleeping in David's arms almost as much as she enjoyed the lovemaking that preceded it.

Then why, she asked herself, wouldn't she marry him? It was by no means the first time she'd wrestled with the question. There was more to it than the aftertaste of a bad marriage, she admitted to herself in her more self-analytical moments. This relationship, after all, was in no way comparable to the one she'd had with Geoffrey, who had been so much older and had never let her forget how superior he was to her on every level. She and David had so much to offer each other; they were complementary equals.

Perhaps she was afraid that marriage would somehow alter that fine balance, and spoil the relationship. Certainly to legalise the union would endanger its spontaneity. Their lovemaking now was both frequent and spontaneous: would marriage make it routine and taken-for-granted?

But she didn't want to lose him, she knew. That would be an even greater evil. Self-sufficient though she was, Lucy hadn't realised how much she'd hated her solitary life until she'd found someone to share it with. Was she being unrealistic, hoping to have her cake and eat it, to enjoy the benefits of togetherness without the ossifying commitment of marriage? And was it fair to David, when he wanted to marry her so badly?

She dreaded the day when he would come home and tell her that he'd finally sorted out the inheritance, and could move into the house near Kensington Gardens. It would force them to talk about it, the subject that had become so painful for them both that it was now taboo. And ultimately it would propel her into some kind of decision. Until then, though, she would do everything possible to maintain the status quo.

That was what was so worrying about Ruth's visit, Lucy realised. It was a threat to the status quo. And, she asked herself, looking around, wherever would she put her things?

‘The cupboard under the stairs was a great idea,' David complimented her the next morning as they waited at Euston Station.

‘I had a sudden inspiration. It's always been a convenient glory hole, so I thought – why not?' She'd cleaned it out, had thrown out quite a bit of rubbish, and transferred the rest to the loft for the time being. ‘It should work quite well – there's room for her to hang a few clothes, and shelves for her bits and pieces. You'll see. It won't be so bad.' She squeezed his hand, wishing that she felt as confident about it as she sounded.

‘What is she like?' David squinted up at the arrivals board; her train was due at any moment. His contact with teenage girls throughout the course of his life had been minimal, and his apprehensiveness was increasing by the minute.

Lucy qualified her reply. ‘I haven't seen her for nearly a year, but she actually reminds me quite a bit of myself at that age. Other people say so, too – my brother always says that it's like déjà vu.'

‘Oh, well, that's all right, then.' His relief was evident.

She gave a wicked laugh. ‘You don't know what I was like.'

‘I know what you're like now, and you couldn't have been so very dreadful then,' David asserted loyally.

‘I wouldn't be so sure about that if I were you.'

He exhaled on a sigh as the train from Northampton pulled into the station, and they waited in silence while the Saturday morning passengers trickled through the barrier. It was a different crowd from the Monday-through-Friday commuters: mostly parents with young children, coming to London for a day's outing, the children already whipped into hyperactivity by their train journey and the parents already showing signs of exhaustion. There was a sprinkling of well-dressed matrons with empty shopping bags, most likely bound for Knightsbridge, a few couples on their way to the West End for matinées at various theatres, and the inevitable rag-tag of international backpackers, young people weighed down with enormous rucksacks and large bottles of Evian water, jabbering to each other in German or Italian. David wondered inconsequentially what sights might have drawn them to Northampton; it didn't seem likely that they would be interested in shoe factories or even Eleanor Crosses.

‘There's Ruth,' said Lucy, pointing. Near the end of the stream, just behind a harassed mother trying to corral three overexcited small boys, was a girl on her own, slowed down by the wobbling progress of an oversized suitcase on wheels, wearing the singularly unattractive uniform of her generation: faded jeans, a leather jacket over a T-shirt, and great clomping Doc Marten boots. At the barrier she straightened up and looked around anxiously, then spotted her aunt and waved. ‘Hi, Aunt Lucy.'

David drew in his breath. To say that Ruth Kingsley resembled Lucy was not quite accurate. She was like her, yes, but in the manner of an out-of-focus photograph, or even more accurately like two paintings of the same subject executed in different media, by different artists. If Lucy was the watercolour, then her niece was the oil painting, altogether more vibrant in colouring and bolder in style. Where Lucy's hair was a pale, shimmery red-gold, the colour of ripe apricots, Ruth's was unashamedly red – almost orange – and cut short so that the curls were more pronounced, standing out around her face in an aggressive Afro. Ruth's eyes were a true green, rather than the blue-green of Lucy's; her skin was whiter than Lucy's peaches-and-cream coloration, and was demarcated by a sprinkling of freckles across her nose. Ruth's features, too, were reminiscent of Lucy's, but the overall effect was quite different: while Lucy was an attractive – some might say beautiful – woman, not even a fond parent could claim that Ruth Kingsley was other than a rather plain girl, though the charitable might add that she had the potential to grow into her looks. It was as if, thought David, she hadn't quite caught up with her face; her nose and her mouth seemed out of proportion to everything else, and the size of her mouth was only exacerbated by an awesome array of glinting hardware when she pulled back her lips in a smile. Poor kid, he found himself thinking.

Lucy stated the obvious. ‘Ruthie, darling! You've got a brace on your teeth!'

The smile faded. ‘Since last summer,' she admitted. ‘I have to wear it for two years, probably. And please don't call me Ruthie,' she added. ‘I'm not a baby any more, Aunt Lucy.'

The girl hung back awkwardly, but Lucy moved forward to embrace her. ‘Darling, it's so good to see you. It's been so long!'

‘Almost ten months,' Ruth stated in a voice that, even muffled in a hug, was clearly accusing. ‘Not since the christening last May, remember? Aunt Lucy, why haven't you been to see us for so long?'

This evoked the very guilt it was meant to produce; Lucy had realised recently how little she had seen of her family, apart from her father, since her involvement with David. Her response was defensive. ‘It hasn't really been that long,' she said, contradicting herself.

‘Your Aunt Lucy is a very busy person,' David put in.

Ruth pulled away from Lucy to look at him, while Lucy performed a hurried introduction. ‘Ruth darling, this is my friend Mr Middleton-Brown. David. You know, the one who's going to help you with your work experience.'

‘Hi.' Ruth gave him a rather stiff nod as she tried to assess him. She didn't much like the way he was hovering around Aunt Lucy, and she definitely didn't like the way he'd spoken to her in Aunt Lucy's defence. She hadn't been talking to
him
, after all – who did he think he was? And why did he have to be here, anyway, when she wouldn't start her work experience until Monday morning? She'd been looking forward to having Aunt Lucy all to herself this weekend, without her parents or her brothers around to share the attention.

David could feel the hostility radiating from the girl, but was at a loss to understand the reason for it. Bewildered, he overcompensated with a false smile and a jolly manner. ‘We're really pleased to have you, aren't we, Lucy? Now, let me take your case. It must be awfully heavy for a girl like you.'

Ruth pressed her lips together – a painful thing to do given the quantity of hardware in her mouth – and made a lunge for the handle of her case. In a complete contrast to Lucy's natural grace, her movements were gawky and graceless. ‘No, thank you. I can do it myself. It's got wheels.' With a determined grunt, she pulled it into motion.

Before David could protest and take it from her, Lucy caught his eye and shook her head slightly. ‘Well, at least I've brought the car,' said David ruefully, as they followed Ruth and the wobbling behemoth in a slow, awkward procession through Euston Station.

After Ruth had unpacked and settled her possessions in the cupboard under the stairs, and after they'd had some lunch, they moved into the sitting room to discuss the plans for the afternoon. Ruth scooped up a somewhat reluctant Sophie and claimed the spot next to Lucy on the sofa, relegating David to a chair. ‘Nice kitty,' she crooned, ignoring Sophie's squirms.

‘We wondered, darling, what you'd like to do this afternoon,' Lucy began. She and David had discussed it at length, and had a few ideas, but had decided to leave the final decision up to Ruth.

‘I don't know,' Ruth said unhelpfully, her head bent over the cat.

‘We thought that you might like to go to one of the museums – the Science Museum or the Natural History Museum,' David put in. ‘They're not far from here, you know.'

Ruth looked up at him and wrinkled her nose. ‘That sounds dead boring. I hate science, and I can't think of anything more boring than a load of old dinosaur bones.'

‘Well, how about the Tower of London, then?' suggested Lucy.

‘We went there on a school outing. Boring. Full of naff American tourists, all saying that they want to take the Crown Jewels home for a souvenir.'

‘There's always the zoo, though it's still a bit chilly for that,' said David.

‘Zoos are for little kids,' Ruth stated with an indignant scowl at him. ‘I told you, I'm not a baby.'

‘Of course you're not,' Lucy said quickly, giving David a warning look. ‘He didn't mean to imply that you were. Lots of grown-ups enjoy the zoo, too.' Before Ruth could express her opinion of the sort of grown-ups who enjoyed the zoo, she went on, ‘There's Madame Tussaud's, or any of the art museums. Or we could even go shopping at Covent Garden, or Harrods, or the General Trading Company.'

‘Him too?' she nodded her head in David's direction.

‘Yes, of course.'

‘I'd rather wait and go shopping with just you, Aunt Lucy. Shopping's much more fun without men around. Dad goes spare when he has to take me and Mum shopping.'

Lucy, fighting to curb her own rising irritation, didn't dare to look at David. ‘Well, where would you like to go then, Ruth darling?' she asked sweetly, thinking to herself, Oh God, it's going to be a long three weeks.

Clutching Sophie to her chest, Ruth thought hard. ‘How about Westminster Abbey?' she said at last. ‘We've been doing Elizabeth I at school, and I'd like to see her tomb. I think she was pretty cool. And I'd like to go to Evensong.'

‘Well, that's settled, then.' Relief and exasperation were mingled on David's face as he rose from the chair. The fact that the girl wanted to visit a church was something in her favour at least as far as David was concerned, and it redeemed her slightly in his mind. Though her affinity for Elizabeth I was no accident, he told himself wryly: it takes one imperious redhead to appreciate another.

They passed a few hours in Westminster Abbey, taking one of the supertours and then poking around the chapels on their own, paying homage to Elizabeth I. Ruth deigned to do a rubbing of a lady with a horned headdress and a supercilious expression in the brass rubbing centre, while Lucy and David strolled round the cloister, and then it was time for Evensong.

A well-sung cathedral-style Choral Evensong was one of the chief pleasures of David's life; by closing his eyes and losing himself in the music and the liturgy – the beautiful, time-honoured cadences of the Book of Common Prayer – he was able to forget for a few moments what a trial the next three weeks were likely to be. Thus Lucy was the first to notice a fellow worshipper on the opposite side of the stalls. During the first reading she nudged him gently. ‘Look,' she whispered, ‘there's Rachel Nightingale over there.'

Immersed in the tranquillity of the service, Rachel didn't see them until the very end, as the verger led the choir and clergy out of the stalls and the congregation stood. After the organ voluntary had finished, she crossed the chancel with a smile. ‘Hello, Lucy. How are you?'