Face the Wind and Fly (4 page)

Chapter Four

When Kate was just nine she entered a competition to design and build a bridge from a set of specified objects – pipe cleaners, wooden skewers, string, paper clips, no more than four biro pens and a maximum of four bulldog clips. The bridge was to be judged for the size of its span, the weight it could bear without collapsing and its aesthetic appeal (‘how nice it looks’, the competition blurb said). The competition, part of a local Science Festival, was to take place in a big hall in Exeter and competitors had an hour to complete their bridge. Kate spent a month practising. Every morning when she woke up, she would draw another design, every afternoon when she got home from school, she tried to build it. She was obsessed, and utterly determined to win. On the day, she was the only girl to take part, which only increased her doggedness.

Her bridge was good. It was very good. In her own eyes it was certainly the best – but a boy won.

‘Mine was
loads
better!’ she wailed to her father, who’d only been able to look on helplessly as she came an honourable second.

‘His was a little bigger, darling.’

‘But it looked
rubbish
.’

‘Sadly, the judges didn’t think so. Come on love, let’s go and get an ice cream and celebrate. You did come second!’

Later, she wondered if the judges had assumed that her father had designed the bridge and penalised her for it. He was a professor of engineering and she found everything he did beautiful. That bridge had been all her own work, though, and the unfairness of the decision had been devastating. She was upset and bitter for months, but the episode taught her two things: first, that as a girl in a male-dominated field, you need to try not just harder, but ten times harder than the boys in order to succeed – and second, that she did not like losing. These lessons had stayed with her over the years and coloured her entire career.

Now, looking at the chart Jack Bailey was spreading out in front of her, she knew she had to call on those lessons yet again.

‘We need to put the access road up to the wind farm
here
.’ Jack pointed at a line he’d drawn.

Jack had been in charge of the Summerfield project and now he was her assistant. If he harboured resentment, then he might challenge her authority. Besides, he didn’t know the area as she did. One glance at the map was enough to tell Kate his proposed route wouldn’t work. ‘We can’t, Jack.’

‘Can’t? It’s the obvious place.’

‘I know. But that will drive right through a small patch of ancient oak wood and the locals won’t stand for it.’

‘Then we need to do some PR work with the locals and get it sorted.’

‘Sorry. No. I did look at that early on. That’s why I drew the access the other way, round the back of Summerfield Boggs.’

‘But it’ll almost double the cost,’ Jack protested.

He didn’t like having to answer to her, she could see that. She’d have to be tactful, but it was important to stamp her authority on this. She understood now why Mark wanted her to head up the job – making the right choices now would be much easier and more cost-effective in the long run, and local knowledge would certainly help. She held firm. ‘I know. But trust me, Jack, it’s going to be the only way. Once we go into the consultation stage we’ll need to keep the community on side as much as possible, it’s going to be hard enough to win some of them round as it is.’

She refrained from saying, That’s why I’m project-managing and you’re not, but she knew from Jack’s ill-concealed scowl that he wasn’t happy. She moved the discussion on. ‘How are the land lease negotiations coming on?’

‘The two farmers whose land we need for the turbines are happy. They’re going to make shedloads of money, so they should be. The Forgie House Trust might be a stumbling block though. The access road will need to pass the House whichever route we take further up.’

‘Keep at it, Jack, you’re doing a great job.’ Kate doubted that the praise would mollify him, but cumulative compliments might help over the long haul. ‘Have you got any meetings set up yet? We’ll need to start with the Community Council, of course, and the heritage and environment bodies. Plus, we’ll have to put some real thought into how we tackle things locally if we’re going to avoid confrontation.’

Jack consulted his notes. ‘There’s a meeting with Forgie and Summerfield Community Council in the diary. I’ve heard that someone’s already organising a petition against the project, but there’s not much we can do about that.’

‘No. All we can do is give the positive arguments for this wind farm and be prepared to answer questions as honestly as we can. And Jack—’

‘Yes?’

‘Leave out the direct access route on the plans, will you?’

Kate was so immersed in Summerfield that she got home late.

‘Did you remember my burgers?’ Ninian demanded as soon as she got through the door.

She dropped her bulging briefcase on the kitchen floor, tired. The start of a project was the most demanding stage – all builds had disasters and needed firefighting, but thinking the task through properly at the beginning made life much easier. ‘I forgot to go to the supermarket,’ she confessed.

‘Mu-um!’

‘It’s no big deal, Ninian, there’s enough food in the house for a month.’

‘I was looking forward to my burgers,’ Ninian said, glowering.

‘Really Ninian! There’s pasta and rice and plenty of basics like cheese and eggs. And the freezer’s well enough stocked to see us through a siege.’

‘But—’

‘And stop sounding like a five-year-old. We can manage for one night.’ She filled a saucepan with water and stuck it on the stove. ‘Where’s your father?’

Ninian shrugged. ‘I dunno.’

Kate glanced over at the kitchen clock. It was seven thirty. ‘Is he out?’

‘I dunno.’

The wall calendar in the kitchen doubled as the family engagement diary. Kate studied it. ‘There’s nothing in for tonight. Did he go out after you came home from school?’

‘I
dunno
, Mum, I told you.’ Ninian jerked open the fridge door angrily and muttered, ‘He’s been acting weirdly recently.’

‘What? Stop mumbling, Ninian. What did you say?’ What was wrong with him?

Ninian slammed the fridge door shut. ‘There’s no bloody cheese. I said he’s been acting weirdly. Hadn’t you noticed?’

‘Don’t swear. And no, I hadn’t noticed. What do you mean, weirdly?’

The water was bubbling. She opened the spaghetti jar and shoved a couple of handfuls into the saucepan. She’d no real idea of how much to cook, hopefully she’d got it about right.

There was a slam of a door and Andrew called, ‘Hi! I’m home! Sorry I’m so late.’

‘We’re in here.’

Andrew appeared at the kitchen door, casual in rust-coloured chinos and a soft white shirt, open at the neck.

‘Where’ve you been?’

‘In Edinburgh. I had a meeting with my agent, he’s up from London. Didn’t I tell you?’

‘No, you didn’t. Or Ninian. The poor boy’s been wondering where you were.’

He was unruffled. ‘Sorry. I thought I’d said. Anyway, I brought you some flowers to make up for it.’

He produced a bunch of sorry-looking petrol forecourt chrysanthemums. Kate took them doubtfully. Andrew was not given to buying flowers, not even third-rate ones and judging by the quality of these, that was perhaps a good thing. ‘Thanks.’

‘And I called in for a Chinese at the Yangtse Palace, which held me up even more – I hope you haven’t eaten yet?’ He hoisted two white carrier bags onto the breakfast bar and started to unload a stack of hot foil cartons.

‘You could have called. I’ve just put on some pasta.’

‘I wasn’t thinking, sorry. We can have pasta salad tomorrow, let’s eat this while it’s hot. Ninian, get some plates, would you?’

Whatever Ninian had meant by ‘acting weirdly’, Kate thought, he was surely mistaken. Everything Andrew was doing seemed quite normal to her. But Ninian, who had been fiddling with his place mat during this explanation, slammed it down on the table. ‘You’re such a bloody convincing storyteller, Dad, you could tell fucking lies to the Pope and get him to believe you.’

Kate said, ‘
Ninian!
’ but to her astonishment, Andrew ignored his son’s outburst. He merely said, calmly, ‘No lie, Ninian. Why don’t you settle down and just enjoy some Singapore noodles and king prawns?’

But Ninian, who adored Chinese food, stood up and walked out.

Kate fell in love with Andrew one rainy afternoon sixteen years ago. They’d met in a cinema café, forced to share a table by a swift, torrential shower that drove people indoors. The attraction had been instant. Coffee turned into a drink, a drink turned into dinner, dinner somehow led to Kate’s flat and, with her boyfriend away, to bed.

It wasn’t behaviour she condoned, she was fiercely loyal and by principle monogamous, but never in her lifetime had Kate experienced such monumental, uncontrollable lust. Had they slept that night? Perhaps dozed, briefly, entwined round each other like columbine, arms and legs turned into tendrils. Between dozing, they explored each other’s bodies in childlike delight before, inevitably, joining once more in a sweet union that led to utter ecstasy.

As light dawned, Kate confessed, ‘I have a boyfriend.’

Andrew, gazing at her with the lazy, sleepy eyes that had captivated her from that first encounter, said, ‘And I’m married.’

‘What?’ She sat up abruptly.

He pulled her back down and rolled half over her, pinning her to the sheet with gentle force. ‘It’s not working. It hasn’t been working for a long time. But it took me till tonight to understand that it’s over.’

It was a great line, and she fell for it. Who wouldn’t?  How silly of her, though, not to have considered that he might be married. She’d only ever dated schoolboys and students, she had no experience at all of older men.

It was the first hiccup. The path of true love, Kate discovered by way of another cliché, never did run smooth. Andrew was not only older than she was, she discovered that he was
nineteen years
older, a gap that required a series of adaptations and compromises that weren’t entirely easy. Soon she discovered that he not only had a wife, he also had a son – and that brought a further shock. Andrew had married Val when he was only nineteen and Harry had arrived soon afterwards. Kate did quick sums in her head and was horrified.

‘That makes him older than me!’

‘You’ll love him,’ Andrew assured her.

Kate had a feeling it might not be quite straightforward, but she was an engineer. She liked order and structure. If a job had to be done, she first planned the process required for efficient results. She started to pave the way for Harry liking her, but soon discovered that people don’t obey flow charts and systems quite so neatly as building bridges or wind turbines.

She thought about that a lot in the early days. ‘How,’ she demanded of Charlotte one morning some months later, when she was desperately trying to calm a howling baby Ninian and feeling horribly out of control, ‘did this happen? How am I here? Tell me.’

‘Lust,’ Charlotte answered honestly and they both burst out laughing. Charlotte’s hair had still been naturally golden then, her face smooth and fresh, while all Kate was conscious of in those days was the dark rings under her own eyes from lack of sleep.

Now Andrew was so much a part of her life that a new order had been constructed that no longer felt odd, or difficult, or anything other than completely natural. Kate had never dissected her marriage, never taken it apart and examined the bones of it, nor felt the need to. Yet for some reason she could feel the sands shifting under her, the infinitesimal rearranging of a million grains as the sea drains back. Ninian’s comment rattled round her head.
You could tell fucking lies to the Pope and get him to believe you.
Why hadn’t Andrew reprimanded him? And what the hell had he been talking about? The muttered conversation between Ninian and Harry at the party played again in her mind. ‘
Don’t you dare tell Kate,
’ Harry had said, and Ninian had answered, ‘
But I saw them, I tell you!
’

Tell her what? Saw who? Small doubts, but they wormed their way into Kate’s brain and she couldn’t stop thinking about them.

Chapter Five

Forgie village hall was a stone-built Victorian building, functional but shabby. The whole place begged for redecoration. There was a corner where the roof leaked and damp had leached in. It needed to be sorted but money, as ever, was the issue. The main hall was big enough for a badminton court and there was a small stage at one end. Tonight it was the venue for the launch of
Martyne Noreis and the Body in the Belfry
– despite the fact that Andrew had become something of a celebrity, he still unveiled each novel locally. Rows of chairs were set out facing the stage, where Andrew and an interviewer would sit. Kate, who hated being late for anything, had made a particular effort to be here in good time because she hadn’t yet broken the news to Andrew that she couldn’t stay on afterwards. Instead, she had to make an after-dinner speech at a conference for renewables engineers – in fact, she should be there now.

The room was already busy. Kate, feeling self-conscious in her little black dress and Chan Luu slate-to-white ombré scarf, spied Ninian waving at her and made her way down to the front.

‘Saved you a seat.’

‘Thanks, darling.’ She gave him a hug although she was never quite sure these days how he would respond to that.

Tonight he hugged her back. ‘You look neat.’

‘Afraid I’ve got to rush off right after. I’m giving a speech at a dinner.’ Ninian’s face fell.  ‘I know, I am sorry, love. I should be there now.’

He was clearly upset. He shoved his hand abruptly through his thick hair so that it stood on end and his eyebrows drew together alarmingly. ‘Mum, for fuck’s sake—’

‘What? Don’t swear.’

‘It’s Dad’s launch. If you’re not there for him he’s going to—.’

‘Going to do what?’ Why was he looking so dismayed? ‘Anyway, I am here now, aren’t I? Where
is
Dad?’ She glanced at her watch, itching for the reading to start so that it finished on time, because otherwise she’d need to slip out while it was still taking place and that would be embarrassing.

‘Round the back somewhere.’ He kicked at the leg of the chair in front of him, scowling. ‘The Maneater’s come.’

‘What are you talking about?’

He nudged her and she looked along the row. Harry and Jane were on Ninian’s left and on the far side of them was Jane’s cousin, Sophie MacAteer, wearing what seemed to be a vintage dress and Fifties-style hat. She was perched on the edge of her chair in a pose of eager anticipation. Ninian’s scowl deepened into a glare.

‘Sophie bleep MacAteer,’ he muttered, ‘alias the Maneater.’

‘Why do you say that?’ Ninian’s dislike was clear – but what could have sparked such strong antipathy? He could only have met her once, surely?

There was no time for explanations because Andrew and the interviewer, a local journalist, arrived on stage. The audience settled, eagerly.

‘So, Andrew, tell us about Martyne Noreis.’

Kate had seen Andrew do this dozens of times and she had a speech to prepare. She fumbled in her bag for her notebook. She felt Harry glaring at her, but her fingers sensed the sharp edges of the book, so she slipped it out. 
Myth and reality,
she scribbled.
Why renewable energy is important. NB Joke here.

Andrew was filling in the background to his medieval detective. ‘Martyne Noreis started life as a ploughboy in Athelstaneford, in East Lothian. It’s AD735.’

He was a natural-born storyteller and his audience was rapt. Distracted, Kate’s pen hovered. Andrew could be magnetic and tonight he was really on form.

‘I’ve always thought there was something magical about Athelstaneford. I dreamed about a ploughboy there who had special skills. Some locals thought he belonged to the occult, but although Martyne runs up against people who want to burn him as a warlock, he always manages to escape.’

‘Luckily for us readers,’ the journalist said. ‘So, Andrew, are his skills supernatural?’

‘Not at all. He’s very human, with many human frailties. Martyne is just very observant. He’s an eighth-century Sherlock Holmes or Hercule Poirot.’

‘There seems to be a lot of murder in Athelstaneford.’

‘Fraid so. Fortunately, Martyne always manages to solve it. He looks at little signs, tracks or beaten down grass, or some hair caught in a wooden fence post, puts the clues together and finds the culprit.’

The journalist cleared her throat and moved things along. ‘Thank you, Andrew, for explaining that. Now, the moment everyone’s been waiting for – a reading from your new novel.’

There was a ripple of applause and Andrew stood up and moved across to where a lectern had been set up with a microphone. He found a marker in the book and opened it at the page.

‘
He caught a faint muffled sound of horses hooves in the distance. Martyne lifted his head to listen. He was no longer a ploughboy. He was married to Ellyn, the chieftain’s daughter, and was a farmer with land of his own. Aye, there it was, three fields away, heading along the track to the kirkyard. He could spy it through the early morning mist, where the pale, low sun loomed through the haze like a forgotten night lantern in the grey sky. The rumble of the cart over the stones reached him now as well. The cart bearing Alys Rolland’s body. There was a mystery there. He could smell it.
’

There was collective intake of breath and a ripple of applause. Kate glanced surreptitiously at her watch. To her left, Sophie MacAteer was wide-eyed and excited. Her face was shining, the pale skin like some deep-sea creature’s, almost translucent.

Andrew said, ‘Martyne has been talking to some of the villagers about how Alys came to die. The fact that she was in the belfry of the church has put him off the scent, but a discovery when he’s out walking one day gives him his first real clue.

‘
The path through the woods was dank. Syme, his dog, felt the glumness of the place and trotted dolefully by his side, tail down, head drooping. The sheep he was searching for must have come this way, Martyne thought, spying a wisp of wool snagged on a low clump of bog myrtle. He stopped. Bog myrtle? Here? He’d never seen it growing deep in the woods. Surely the soil was all wrong. Syme sniffed at the plant with interest as Martyne squatted down to examine it. As he thought. It was not bog myrtle at all, it was dwale. And there were signs that someone had been disturbing the soil around the base of the plant in recent months. It was possible – nay, likely – that someone had even set the shrub to grow here, in this secret place, to avoid its detection.
’

Someone behind Kate called, ‘Dwale? Is that a made up name?’

The voice sounded familiar. She peered over her shoulder. It was Ibsen Brown, her acquaintance from the top of Summerfield Law, his blue eyes brilliant under the artificial light, his long hair again pulled tightly back from his face.

‘No. It’s the Anglo Saxon word for something we know by a completely different name, deadly nightshade, or belladonna. There is quite an Anglo Saxon influence in southern parts of Scotland, so it’s not unlikely that Martyne would have known it by this common name.’

‘And calling it dwale keeps the secret from the reader just a little longer,’ Ibsen grinned.

Kate turned back to the stage, smiling. He’d put his finger on Andrew’s technique precisely.

‘Exactly. And now I’ve let the cat out of the bag. But,’ he snapped the book shut and held it up, cover side to the audience, ‘there are plenty more cats in here, and a few bags too, and if you want to know any more, can I suggest you buy the book?’

As the applause started, Kate tossed her notebook into her handbag and stood up. ‘I’ve got to go. Sorry.’

Harry said, ‘Not going for dinner?’

‘I’m sorry, but it’s impossible tonight. I’ve a really unfortunate diary clash. I’m giving a speech—’

 She had to go but with her stepson’s gaze on her she put the moment off.

Andrew appeared by her side, looking pleased with himself. ‘Well? What did you think? That go well?’

‘Brilliant, Dad.’

‘Loved it. Another triumph.’

‘Are we all set for dinner?’

‘Kate’s got to rush off,’ Harry said.

She looked apologetically at Andrew. ‘Sorry, love. I forgot to tell you.’ Guilt pressed down on her but she pushed back at it by remembering how she’d rushed home early to change so that she could be here at all, and that she hadn’t eaten and would miss dinner at both functions. She was about to point this out to him so that he could appreciate the lengths she’d gone to but she knew that was just defensiveness. If necessary she could explain later.

Harry said, ‘Actually, we won’t be able to make it this time ourselves. Jane’s flying down to London in the morning and she’s got to get up at four. In fact, we’d better head off soon too.’

So Harry couldn’t go either! Kate pursed her lips in annoyance. How dare he be so critical of her when he was ducking out himself?

Andrew’s face grew longer. A family dinner after the local launch was all part of the ritual. He turned to Ninian. ‘Looks like it’ll be you and me then, Ninian.’

‘Fine.’

‘I can come.’ Sophie MacAteer had been standing on the fringes of the family group, Kate realised, hanging on like a limpet. ‘I’m not in a hurry to go anywhere tonight.’

‘Just the three of us then.’

Ninian scowled. He scuffed one toe against the floor, kicking at some imaginary spot. ‘Actually, I’ve just remembered, I told Cuzzer we could finish the game we’re playing on the X Box.’

It didn’t seem like an ideal solution, but Kate really had to go. She kissed Andrew briefly. ‘Right then. Sorry love. Must dash.’

She hurried towards the door, but was caught by Frank Griffiths.

‘About Summerfield,’ he growled, blocking her path, ‘you do realise, don’t you, how disastrous the project will be for us all?’

She was late. She was put out by Harry’s hypocrisy. Under these pressures, diplomacy deserted her. ‘I’m sorry, Frank,’ she said, her voice crisp, ‘I don’t have time to discuss this right now, but you’re absolutely wrong.’

‘AeGen absolutely cannot be allowed to go forward with this plan.’

‘We’re just putting a mast in, that’s all.’

‘We’ll be opposing it.’ He leaned forward, his face so close to hers for a moment that their noses almost touched. His face was ruddy with pent-up anger but she didn’t retreat by an inch and it was Frank who gave ground first. He gained control of himself, swivelled on his heel, and marched off. Kate drew a breath and felt her body soften, as if a moment of danger had passed. She turned to the door for the second time, but just as she did so, someone stepped in front of her. It was Ibsen Brown. ‘The Germinator’.

He grinned. ‘Oops.’

She stepped the other way. So did he. She frowned in exasperation and his grin widened.

‘Sorry.’ She moved again. He mirrored her move.

‘Dear me,’ he said with a smile that split his face. Despite her irritation, she couldn’t help liking the effect. ‘We’ll have to sort this out, won’t we?’ He took her firmly by the elbows and her arms tensed like springs at his touch. He moved her to one side. ‘There. I wait, you move. Right?’

‘Thank you.’ She said it coolly, though she was finding the intense blue of his eyes extremely disconcerting.

‘What did you say your name was?’

Had he really forgotten? Her ego punctured, she said, ‘Kate. Kate Courtenay.’

‘Suits you. Short and spiky.’

She was taken aback at the judgement and couldn’t help showing it.

‘No offence meant. Sorry to get in your way.’ Again, the grin flashed. Each line in his face, she suspected, told a story. Not one of his features was quite even, but there was something about its liveliness that was definitely interesting.

‘No problem.’ She swung away. Now she really was short of time.

‘Kate,’ he said.

She turned, puzzled. ‘Yes?’

‘Nothing.’ There was a gleam in his eyes. ‘Nice to meet you again, Kate.’

Kate and Andrew’s bedroom had the elegant proportions typical of early Georgian architecture. It was roughly square, which she liked, but its best feature was the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the garden. There was one on either side of Kate’s dressing table, where she kept the miniature gargoyle Andrew had brought her from Melrose Abbey (his first gift), her grandmother’s scent bottle – a treasured relic of her childhood – and the small box with Ninian’s first baby tooth. The room was perhaps looking a little shabby now because it hadn’t been redecorated for years, not since she’d blitzed the place with the enthusiasm of a new owner, but the deep pile cream carpet and pale blue silk curtains still pleased her. It was a calming room – and calm was what she needed by the time her long days drew to a close.

When she got back from the dinner, Andrew was already in bed, reading. He was wearing a black tee shirt. For his age, he was still enormously attractive.

‘Interesting book?’

He angled it towards himself and showed her the cover. It was a history tome. Nothing new there. ‘You look tired.’

‘Mm. But I must read these papers.’ She held up her briefcase. ‘I’ve got a meeting first thing and what with your book launch and that damned dinner—’

‘Oh, right,’ he mumbled, immersing himself once more in his book.

Kate blinked. Things had changed and she hadn’t noticed. Once she would have thought it impossible to get into a bed with Andrew Courtenay to
read
. Once he would have considered bringing a book into bed insulting. Ninian’s cryptic comments swirled back into her head.
Sophie Maneater.
If you’re not there for him he’s going to—

She dropped the briefcase. Andrew didn’t even look up at the thud, just tutted at some small irritation in the text and turned a page. Kate peeled her clothes off. Andrew turned another page. Kate glanced down at her naked body, realising that she had never examined it critically. So long as it functioned well, she was comfortable with it. Now she squinted down at it objectively. She was slim and fit, her skin was still taut, there were no unsightly love handles – but Andrew was still reading. Had she stopped being desirable? The duvet cover was cream with a blue fleur-de-lys pattern. Like the decor, it had aged. It was functional, but hardly sexy. Perhaps she should buy some new bed linen, and maybe some silk lingerie? She slipped into bed and gently removed the book from his hands.