advancing towards them. Caspar detected the look of naked lust in some of the women’s faces as they watched their leader climb the stairs. So it wasn’t just greed for money that had brought him here: it was the pumping up of his gigantic ego too.
They came to a room at the furthest end of a long, thin corridor and a door that had had many layers of paint added to it over the years; it was chipped in places, particularly around the handle. Hall knocked softly. ‘Damson, it’s me, Roland. I’ve brought someone to see you.’
So the weasel hadn’t even bothered to tell her he was coming!
As they entered the room, it was impossible to know who was more shocked: Damson at the sight of Caspar, or Caspar because he couldn’t believe the devastating change in his sister.
Shock rendered him immobile. He stood staring at the woman sitting in the bay window. For a moment, he almost convinced himself that this was some cheap trick on Hall’s part. Where’s my sister? he wanted to shout. What have you done with her? Who is this bone-thin woman with hollow cheeks and gruesomely short hair?
But the words that came out were, ‘My God, Damson, what have these charlatans done to you?’ Then he was across the room, kneeling on the floor in front of her, clasping her cold hands in his.
Caspar wasn’t aware of Hall leaving them, but when he raised his eyes to Damson’s pale face, he saw that the door was shut and they were alone.
‘Oh, darling Caspar, why have you come? I didn’t want you to see me like this.’ She brushed the hair back from his forehead, kissed him tenderly.
Still holding her hands, which had no strength in them, he moved to sit in the chair beside her. ‘I don’t understand what’s going on, Damson. I got a call saying you were ill, that I ought to come and see you. Not for one second did I think it was anything serious. That smug crook, Hall, should have said something. Why didn’t you ring me yourself?’
She sighed. ‘It’s complicated.’
‘Please don’t fob me off. Give me the truth. Do that much for me, tell me what’s wrong. I mean, for God’s sake, you’re … you’re in a wheelchair. Have you been in an accident?’
She shook her head. ‘No accident, Caspar. Truth is, I’m dying.’
The shock of her words winded him and he gasped. She reached out and placed a hand on his forearm. ‘Too much honesty hurts, doesn’t it, darling?’
‘But - but you can’t be! Not you. Anyone but you!’ His head spun and a rushing sound filled his ears.
‘Oh, Caspar, didn’t you know? It happens to the best of us. And who knows, this might be something I get right.’
He simply couldn’t accept what he was hearing. She was being much too cavalier and flippant. He stood up, towered over her frail body, spread his arms in an accusing gesture. ‘It’s this place. They’ve done something to you. If I get you away, you’ll be well again.
You’re probably not eating properly. You could be anorexic’
‘Please sit down, and please calm down, Caspar. This is just why I didn’t want you to see me. Don’t you think I would know if I was anorexic? No, my darling, I have ovarian cancer and I’m in the final stages. We’re talking a tumour as big as a fist. Conservatively, I have weeks to live rather than months. Though, personally, I think it might be less.’
He collapsed on to the chair. ‘No! This can’t be happening.
Damson, you have to listen to me, you have to fight this. I don’t care what you’ve been brainwashed into believing.’
‘No, it’s you who has to listen. I’ve been ill for some time. In fact, that’s why I came here. I met Roland in Bath at a party, a month after I was diagnosed with cancer. He told me about Rosewood Manor, which he had just started up, and the more he told me about it, the more I thought it would be the ideal place for me to live out my remaining days. I needed somewhere to rest. Somewhere I could resolve things. And before you say anything else about Roland, he didn’t know I was ill when we met. I kept it from him … from everyone.’ She paused to take a small shallow breath. ‘You see, Caspar, I knew I wouldn’t have the courage to cope with all that chemotherapy - the nausea, the tiredness. Nor did I want to be constantly in and out of hospital, treated like an experiment. So I decided to be a coward and let nature take its course. It’s for the best.’
Clutching at straws, and with his voice cracking, Caspar said, ‘So if you haven’t tried conventional medicine, how - how do you know it won’t work for you now?’
She smiled at him wanly. ‘Roland made me see a doctor earlier this year when he realised that something was wrong, that I was in pain and had been hiding it from him. After agreeing to see the local man, I saw several specialists who all said the same, that the cancer was so advanced nothing could be done. In a way, I was glad. It meant that I was finally in control of something. You know how flighty and out of control I’ve always been.’ She gave a little laugh, with a brittle, hollow ring.
To his horror, tears filled Caspar’s eyes and he knew real despair.
‘But, Damson, you’re not in control, the cancer is. It’s - it’s killing you and I can’t bear it.’
Seldom did Gabriel consciously keep track of the days, but since Clara had been struck down with flu, he was unusually aware of them. It was now Saturday and this was her third day of being confined to quarters. Each morning when he looked in on her he willed her to feel better, but she seemed to be withering before his eyes. Seeing her so incapacitated made him realise that she wasn’t invincible after all, and that having her here at Mermaid House, where he could look after her, he was repaying a little of her kindness.
He was glad, though, that he had Jonah to share the load, and in more ways than one. Since Thursday night, when he and Jonah had talked - really talked - he had come to know the truth of Clara’s words: Jonah was indeed a gift from Anastasia, and his forgiveness had been instant.
To thank Clara for what she had instigated, Gabriel would go to any lengths. He had told her as much this morning when he and Ned had taken up her breakfast on a tray the lad had decorated with one of his drawings and some flowers picked from the garden. At Jonah’s insistence both Gabriel and Ned were under orders to stay at the foot of her bed, as if her germs were too stupid to travel that far, and from there, Gabriel had thanked her for everything she had done and told her that if there was anything she needed, she had only to ask.
The sound of laughter broke into his thoughts and he turned to look out of the library window. Ned and Jonah were in the garden playing football; the little boy was chasing Jonah, who was heading for a pair of makeshift goalposts - two upturned flower-pots.
Suddenly they caught sight of him and waved. Gabriel waved back, then pointed at his watch, indicating that it was time for lunch.
And time was something he had wasted too much of since his retirement and Val’s death - he had wantonly frittered it away. Well, not now. What he had left, he would make good use of. What had Clara said when she had agreed to sort out Mermaid House? Oh, yes; ‘I’ll give you one week of my precious time, Mr Liberty.’ She was right, time was precious, and he had squandered so much on living in the past. He had allowed himself to feed off his grief and turn it into a destructive force that had nearly cost him everything.
But to make things completely right there was something else he had to do. He was reconciled with Jonah, and now he had to do the same with Caspar and Damson.
‘When were you going to tell me, Damson?’ The question had been on Caspar’s lips since yesterday afternoon when his sister had told him she was dying, but until now, he hadn’t had the nerve to ask it.
They were lying together on her bed, her head turned towards him, and the afternoon sunshine streaming through the windows. It was years since they had lain like this, although as children they had done it all the time, cutting themselves off from the rest of the world.
‘I hadn’t thought that far,’ she said. ‘Cowardice, I’m afraid.’
‘You were never a coward.’
‘We both were, Caspar.’
He raised himself so that he was leaning on his elbow and looking down into her face.
‘Don’t look at me, like that, darling, not when you know I’m speaking the truth. Help me to sit up, and let me tell you what I’ve learned while I’ve been here.’
Caspar slid off the bed and went round to his sister’s side. He lifted her frail body gently so that her shoulders were against the pillows.
He had to force himself not to wince when he touched her because there was nothing to her. The cancer had hollowed out her body until she was just the shell of the beautiful woman she had once been.
Last night, he had listened in horror to her acceptance that her life would soon be over. She had told him that she had everything arranged. When the time came, and she felt it was no longer fair to inflict herself on Rosewood Manor, she planned to go into a hospice: she wanted the minimum of fuss. ‘Just this once, Caspar, I shall behave myself. I intend to go gently into the night.’ He had wanted to go on talking, but she hadn’t had the strength and had fallen asleep.
He had tucked a blanket around her, then sat in the growing shadows as night fell, just staring at the face that had captivated so many men in her wildly extravagant life. Always unpredictable, always exhilarating, she had lived each day as it came, as though - as though it would be her last.
When darkness had fallen, he had gone in search of Roland Hall.
It was supper time and the rest of the inmates had their noses in the trough in the dining room, their voices bright as they chatted. He had experienced a surge of rage as they stuffed their faces while his sister endured untold pain.
‘How is she?’ Hall had asked, when Caspar finally tracked him down.
The man’s mild tone had infuriated him and he’d turned on him savagely. ‘Oh, she’s fine! Bloody marvellous for a woman who’s dying! Why the hell didn’t you tell me?’
‘You must believe me when I say it wasn’t what I wanted, but she made me promise not to. I had to respect her wishes.’
‘So why disrespect her wishes last night and phone me to say I should come?’
‘I thought it was time.’
He’d grabbed Hall by the shoulders. ‘And who do you think you are making all these decisions? God Almighty?’
Still Hall didn’t react. His calmness made Caspar let go of him. He stepped back. ‘I’ll sue you. I’ll sue the shite out of you. You’ve wilfully let my sister go beyond help. You’ve as good as murdered her.’
‘I can assure you, I’ve done no such thing. I only ever wanted the best for Damson. Perhaps when you’re calmer, we’ll talk more. For now, you must be hungry. I’ll send something up on a tray for you both.’
Caspar had gone back upstairs to Damson. She was still sleeping.
He switched on lamps and drew the curtains, wanting to block out the rest of the world. There was a knock at the door and a red-haired girl with a large tray stepped in. She placed it on the low table in front of Damson’s wheelchair then left without a word. Caspar lifted the stainless-steel domes from the plates and saw that the food had been labelled: for Damson there was a bowl of vegetable soup, and for him, poached salmon with a baked potato and a green salad.
Pulling out the stops to impress him, no doubt. He woke Damson, and after she had shaken off her drowsiness, and swallowed a handful of tablets, they ate their supper. He tried not to notice how little of the soup she spooned into her mouth. No wonder she was so thin.
‘You must stay the night,’ she said, when she pushed her tray away. ‘I’ll get Roland to organise a bed for you. There’s a room next door that’s free.’
‘Can’t I sleep in here with you? I could manage in a chair.’
‘No, I’d disturb you. I sleep lightly at night and often read to pass the time.’
‘I could read to you - like old times.’ He nearly choked on his words.
She shook her head. ‘Not tonight. You need to rest.’
He was too dazed to argue with her. Under no other circumstances could he have imagined spending a night at Rosewood Manor, but the world had found a new axis on which to spin and everything was sliding out of his grasp. Nothing felt real anymore.
Now, sitting on the bed with Damson nearly twenty-four hours later, the situation didn’t feel any more real to Caspar. But knowing he had no choice, he was beginning to resign himself to it. He had to accept that, before long, his sister would be dead. He listened now to what she had to say.
‘I know you think Rosewood Manor is a ghastly place full of the lost and insecure,’ she began, ‘and you’d be right. People come here suffering from all sorts of problems: executive burn-out, failed marriages, abuse - oh, yes, I’ve heard heartbreaking life-stories that would bring even you to your knees, Caspar. What Roland has created here, is an oasis of—’ She held up a hand. ‘No, please, don’t interrupt, I don’t have the energy. I wish you could see Roland for what he is. He’s the most honourable and decent man I’ve ever met.
He’s helped me so much. There’s nothing bogus about him, Caspar.
Truly, there isn’t. But I’ve wandered from what I wanted to talk to you about.’ Her voice trailed away and she seemed caught up in her own thoughts, a long way from him. Slowly she drifted back. She said, ‘We need to discuss your future, Caspar.’
‘It’s hardly important to me now, Damson.’
She seemed not to hear him. ‘Did you know that when there’s not much future left, the past magnifies itself and becomes much clearer?’
She didn’t wait for an answer, but continued. ‘We need to talk about Mermaid House, about Dad and Jonah. I want you to promise me something. It won’t be easy, but take it as a woman’s dying wish.’
He swallowed hard. Didn’t she realise how distressing it was for him to hear her speak like this? But then, as if sensing his pain, she touched his cheek. ‘No hiding or running, Caspar. We’re beyond that now. Remember when we used to say, “It’s the two of us against the world”?’
He nodded jerkily, remembering the first time she had ever uttered those words. It had been the night their mother died. He had crept into Damson’s room and stood at the side of her bed. ‘I can’t sleep,’