An Accidental Shroud (3 page)

Reaching the temporary office, he turned to wait for his son before pushing open the office door.

'Morning, Thelma.'

'Morning, Mr Wilding. Nice to see you, Matthew.'

Thelma must have seen Jake arrive on site. Another gooey layer had been added to her lipstick, her library book pushed into a drawer and coffee, the rich dark brew she knew he liked, was already made. He felt, as usual, exasperated with her. He'd told her he didn't mind what she did on the days when she worked here and not at his main office in town. Whether she knitted, read her library romances, filed her nails or twiddled her thumbs, as long as the work was done – and God knows, there was little enough of that to keep her fully occupied at the moment. Thelma, however, middle-aged, widowed and motherly, had old-fashioned ideas about keeping up appearances. She reached for another mug as Matthew came in with his father and carried the coffee on a tray into the adjoining office. A plate of her home-made Shrewsbury biscuits came with it. There was a single yellow rose in a crystal bud vase set incongruously on the rough table that served as a desk.

Matthew reached for a biscuit and took a large bite. 'Mmm. Brilliant!' In fact, the biscuits were nothing special. Good and wholesome, but nothing particularly out of the way. But being charming (to everyone except his father) was a natural part of Matthew's likeable personality, one that endeared him to everyone – especially females, judging by his string of girlfriends. Even Thelma, normally immune to flattery, was smiling plummily back.

When she had poured the coffee and left them to it, Jake remarked, 'To what do we owe this honour, Matthew? Shouldn't you be at the shop?' He tried to make his tone light but for the life of him he couldn't keep out the derogatory inflexion. Matthew, however, merely shrugged. He was wearing the dark suit and discreet tie he wore for work. He looked extremely personable but curiously out of keeping. A track suit, jeans, casual clothes of any kind was more his style, the style that complemented his outdoor tan, crisp, short dark hair and the compact, athletic figure.

'Cousin Nigel,' he said, 'has decided to give me the day off, in lieu. The policy's to open all hours from now on, even Thursday.'

Jake never could work out what Matthew's real feelings were towards Nigel – not, in fact,
his
cousin, but Jake's – nor what his attitude towards his job with him was. For one thing, he was so damned independent it was difficult to imagine him being beholden to anyone. Another thing was the job itself. Impossible, even a few months ago, to imagine Matt working in the rarefied atmosphere of Fontenoy's. From childhood, it had been difficult to keep him off any site of his father's. He was familiar with everything that was going on, with future plans, he knew everyone, had a working relationship with plant, machinery, the whole works. There had never been any question of him doing anything else but join Jake in the business when he left school.

Jake, who was the first to admit he hadn't the faintest idea how to go about handling this new Matthew, pushed the problem to one side. And belatedly, what Matt had just said about Thursday closing suddenly registered with him.

Thinking about it, he decided that if Nigel was prepared to discard the time-honoured custom of half-day closing midweek, his claim that he was really feeling the pinch might not be the simple ploy to get the loan repaid that Jake had thought. That didn't mean Nigel had forgotten the bloody loan, however, not he! Or was prepared to extend its repayment. Not that it was a matter of life and death to either of them, but in the circumstances, its recall would be embarrassing. Jake rubbed a hand down his chin and looked speculatively at Matthew. He decided to speak, even at risk of the rebuff he knew would come.

'If he decides to cut down on staff – well, there's always room for you in the business, you know that.' And always would be, even if it meant getting rid of someone else.

'If there
is
–' Matthew began.

'If there
is
a business much longer', was what he'd been going to say, Jake knew. It would have been a perfectly justifiable remark. The building and construction business was, to put it mildly, in the doldrums. He didn't know why Matthew had bitten off the comment – it was too much to believe that he was having qualms of conscience, or even beginning to realize that all this constant sniping was hardly the best way to get round his father.

Matthew had, in fact, hastily broken off the careless words because he knew it was all too easy, these days, to trigger off one of Jake's right royal rages. Admittedly, they never lasted long, but it was smart to avoid them, or to keep your head below the parapet while they did last.

This present site was Phase One of a development of thirty luxuriously fitted, executive-style homes. One or two were actually occupied, a few more spoken for, but despite massive reductions on the original price, most remained unsold. Yet the real fly in the ointment, as far as Jake was concerned, was the other, adjoining site. The ten acres – and on it the derelict house, unoccupied for dozens of years – which Jake had bought with the intention of demolishing, and which had then, by some fancy footwork on the part of local conservationists, had a preservation order slapped on it. So there the old house still stood, where the new Save All hypermarket, which would have been Jake's saviour, should by now have been rising. Save All were becoming restive, there was every prospect they'd pull out of the deal. Jake, the great Jake, had come unstuck. Instead of being one step ahead, as he always prided himself on being, he'd been two steps behind.

But no way was Matthew going to start feeling sorry for Jake! He'd plenty of other irons in the fire. He drained his coffee and said suddenly, standing up, 'Well, as far as Nigel goes, I'm not staff, I'm one of the family. And anyway, it's what I want to do, right?'

'Is it? Is it really?'

They stared at one another, Matthew uptight and aggressive at what he took to be his father's sarcasm, Jake trying so hard not to be that the cords stood out on his neck.

'I have to go. What was it you wanted?' Matthew asked abruptly, carefully avoiding the use of Jake's name. It was as if 'Dad' had become a dirty word lately.

'It can wait. Oh, all right, then,' Jake added as Matt raised his brows. 'I only wondered if it's such a good idea coming on site to see young Graham – maybe it would be better to arrange to see him outside working hours.'

Jake thought he'd couched this as a suggestion rather than an order, but Matthew stiffened. 'I only called in for a minute because he's co-driving for me this weekend and I wanted to fix things up.'

And here they were again. Back to the real crunch point. Rally driving, which was Matthew's current obsession. If he'd had the money he'd have defied Jake and gone for it, not only as the hobby which it presently was, but as a full-time career, which was what he was naive enough to think it could be. It was the root cause of all the trouble between them. Jake had the upper hand at the moment because he held the purse strings, but he knew that was no real answer.

'Fair enough,' he said, for the moment defeated. He was enough at loggerheads with Matt without adding to it over this. He could hardly complain about him coming to the site, when it was the one thing he tried to encourage. Nor could he grumble about his association with Joss Graham, seeing that he approved of so little else about Matthew these days. He liked Joss, with the reservation that he considered he was wasting his training as a microbiologist, working on a building site. But that was his own affair. He was at least willing to work at whatever he could find, and not content to live on the dole, like so many with his educational achievements these days, unable to find a suitable position when they'd qualified. He had an open, friendly manner, he was a hard worker and, as far as Jake could see, no bad influence on Matthew – though Jake had made it plain enough that he didn't consider it wise for them to get too friendly. If Matthew eventually did come into the firm, it would only make matters difficult. 'Fair enough,' he repeated, 'only don't make it too much of a habit.'

Matthew looked sullen, sketched a hasty farewell and Jake watched him roar off in his hotted-up Golf GTI, in a cloud of red dust. An intensely physical person, too interested in cars and sport and outdoor activities of any kind to have made much impression at school, totally uninterested in anything remotely artistic, only a perfect idiot would believe Matthew had any special, burning desire to spend the rest of his life selling antique jewellery.

With another sigh, Jake turned from the window and took his tie off, loosened his collar. It was like an oven in the office. The air was heavy and thundery. Surely this long, hot summer must come to an end sometime.

It was just after four and Christine, in a carefully chosen white linen trouser suit with a lot of gold costume jewellery, sat at the wheel of her open-topped Lancia outside the station, waiting for Lindsay.

She was last out of the station, after all the others had gone, shoppers clutching classy green Harrods' bags arriving at the same time as commuters since it was Friday, the day they all left London early to extend the weekend. Lindsay, a music student, had her lute case over one shoulder, her bag on the other. She was carrying a heavy holdall but she appeared as unruffled and cool as ever. She stood hesitating at the entrance, as if unwilling to leave its shelter.

Small and composed, uncreased after a hot and crowded train journey, her straight brown hair drawn back from her face, she was as unlike Christine as it was possible to be. Always neat and tidy, like a little girl dressed for a party, today she was wearing a cream silk shirt and a neat, coffee-coloured linen skirt, her only jewellery a pair of small pearl earrings. She frequently made Christine feel too highly-coloured and three sizes too big. Was it fancy that she looked paler than ever, or was it the heat, always so much more trying in the later summer than it was earlier, which gave her that look of fragile translucency? Oh God, Christine thought, with intuitive perception, she's still not better. They hadn't seen the last of the glandular fever that had plagued Lindsay on and off for the last five or six months, depressing and debilitating her. Her holiday in Italy didn't appear to have done her much good.

'Lovely, lovely to see you, darling!'

'Hello, Mother.' Lindsay held up her face to be kissed and they hugged, smiling. Their only point of resemblance, the wide, dazzling smile, was always a surprising and delightful thing to see on Lindsay's small, habitually grave face, but especially now. Until recently, she and Christine had always been close and had had a loving relationship, despite their differences in temperament; they had, after all, been alone together for sixteen years. But Lindsay, for some inexplicable reason, had closed in on herself during her illness, leaving Christine feeling shut out and unhappy.

She'd always tried to be a conscientious mother, even when she'd had to work to support herself and Lindsay; apart from such considerations as natural affection, Christine couldn't bear not to be efficient at everything, including personal relationships. For the umpteenth time, she wondered where she'd gone wrong with Lindsay as she tied a scarf over her brilliant hair and from the glove compartment handed her daughter one, which Lindsay left on her lap.

The big open car slid along smoothly and very fast, guided by Christine's well-shaped, capable hands on the wheel, moving through imperceptible gear changes and well-anticipated corners, so that Lindsay wasn't thrown around as, for instance, when Matthew drove. After she'd answered the usual detailed questionnaire from Christine: questions ranging from how was Italy, was she eating properly – and receiving truthful answers, for Lindsay never lied directly, only by omission – Lindsay asked politely, to change the subject, 'How's Jake?'

'Busy, what else? Cooking up schemes. You know Jake.' Christine negotiated a tricky intersection where the main road crossed the country lane they were travelling along. 'He has something on his mind.'

'What sort of thing?'

'Wish I knew! Business, I expect, it's not doing as well as he'd like.'

'The recession –'

'What are we all going to blame our troubles on when the recession's over?' Christine laughed lightly, grew silent for a while, then resumed her chatter, bringing Lindsay up to date with the latest news, while the hedges rushed dizzily past in the wind generated by the car's passing.

Lindsay, feeling washed out and colourless beside her mother, who always looked so stunning, wished she wouldn't talk so much, wouldn't drive so fast. Not that Christine took risks. It was just that she would have liked the opportunity to be able to drink in the quiet countryside, today looking amazingly green after thirsty, dusty brown London, although the hot summer had brought the first touches of autumn early here, too. More than that, she needed quiet, to be alone in her head for a while before facing them all again.

'Are you sure you're all right, darling?' Christine asked suddenly and Lindsay, jerked out of her introspection, replied too quickly that of course she was, and there was a tight silence of the sort Christine had become only too used to before the last time Lindsay had gone away.

She sometimes thought that having a conversation with her daughter was like unravelling an old jersey for reknitting. For row after row the stitches would streel smoothly away and then would come a snarl, the wool would break off and have to be tied together again. Christine's family had been poor and she had too many memories of having to wear reknit jerseys, the wrong side full of knots which invariably worked through to the front, to be comfortable with the analogy.

Lindsay sat on her bed, feeling suspended, floating. Her luggage was still unpacked, dumped on the floor, reminding her of another time she'd been here, alone in her room with her suitcase packed.

A horrible time. It had nearly been too much for her, the misery had threatened to take her over, so that she had no will of her own. She had thought, hopelessly: my life's out of control. Not to be in control of yourself and your actions was just about the worst scenario she could imagine. Perhaps she ought never to have gone away, alone. She'd always been like a chameleon, taking on the colour of her surroundings. In London, in her dreary and depressing little flat, dark and unacceptable ideas took possession of her. It was only through her music, by throwing herself into her studies, that she had kept sane, but here in this lovely, light-filled house she felt boundless peace, a renewal of energy and a possibility that the future might actually have something in store for her. Italy had helped her to get herself together again, the last dark months were over ... One hurdle was already over, the most difficult: Christine, who always seemed to see right through her, right to the bone. Now there was only Matthew, who was all right, no need to worry about him. And Jake, who was the nearest she'd yet found to a father.