‘That’s true too. OK, then when we’re in the park. With Emmie.’
‘I’ll try and remember.’
She actually forgot all about it, but the next time they were feeding the ducks in Richmond Park, he suddenly took her hand and said, ‘Eliza, I love you.’
‘Oh, my God,’ she said, touched beyond anything, ‘oh, my God, you remembered. Matt Shaw, I love you too.’
‘Good. Right, don’t expect it every time, will you?’
Jack Beckham had invited Eliza to his leaving party.
Her first reaction to the invitation was surprise that he should have remembered her; her second delight that he wanted her there; and her third a serious doubt as to whether she actually wanted to go.
She had been feeling increasingly demoralised. In theory her life was great; she spent a lot of time telling herself so and most days would see her determinedly setting herself to various tasks – finding the new house that Matt wanted, she’d made an offer on a four-storey beauty in Fulham, quite near the river, checking out schools, taking Emmie to endless ballet classes and music clubs and riding lessons, buying her clothes, and of course seeing her friends. Ah yes. Her friends. The girls with whom she had grown up, middle-aged beyond their years, all braying versions of their own mothers, married to carbon copies of their own fathers; quite often she would feel a sort of claustrophobia, a despair at the life she had found herself locked into, and make her excuses and leave.
Her only real friend was Heather. She genuinely looked forward to their weekly meetings at a mother and baby group and to the picnics and outings to the swings that they shared when the weather was nice enough. She admired Heather more than anyone she had ever met. She was so brave, so cheerful, and a wonderful mother; she never smacked Coral, unlike most of the other mothers at the clinic, or shouted at her, or even got seriously cross.
And every time Eliza dropped the pair of them off at Heather’s flat, she looked back at her standing in the doorway with its peeling paint and halfbroken handle, smiling cheerfully and waving, Coral at her side, the smell of dustbins and lavatories mingling in the air, especially in the summer, and wondered how on earth she could ever complain about anything.
It was Maddy who told her that of course she must go the party.
‘You’ll be so sorry if you don’t, and anyway it’ll be fun, everyone’ll be there—’
‘Everyone,’ said Eliza miserably, ‘I don’t know “everyone” any more, it’s all right for you, Maddy, you’re still a star, but me, what do I do every day, poor little woman at home …’
‘Oh, stop feeling so sorry for yourself,’ said Maddy, ‘you’re coming.’
What really made up her mind was Matt offering to babysit; it was so big a concession that she felt she simply couldn’t refuse.
So she bought a new dress and had her hair done and took a taxi from home, feeling like a proper person again, and then had to stand outside in the street for several minutes, gathering her courage to go in.
Once inside, she stood there, absorbing it all, feeling quite drunk just on the atmosphere: the shrieks of recognition, the kisses, the hugs, the bitchy remarks – ‘that hair colour almost suits her’, ‘does that girl really think her legs deserve that dress?’, ‘time he got a different boyfriend, that one makes him look quite old’.
The air was thick with the smell of smoke, marijuana and expensive perfume; the decibel level of the music and the shrieking was very high.
She scarcely moved for two hours: just stood there being kissed and embraced and given drinks and told how wonderful she looked and how much they missed her.
Jack came over and gave her a bear hug. ‘Stupid girl,’ he said, ‘stupid, stupid cow. I might not be leaving if I still had you here, do you know that?’
‘Oh, yes, course I do,’ said Eliza.
‘Want to work for me on the
News
?’
‘I didn’t realise you were going to the
News
.’
‘I am. Deputy editor, with a special brief on features. Which means fashion. I could pay you four times what you got here. And make you properly famous. The Fleet Street girls are all on the sides of buses these days.’
‘Oh Jack, no, I can’t.’
‘Why not? The dwarf must be nearly at school now.’ He called children dwarfs.
‘No, ’fraid not. Anyway, I’m planning on another one soon.’
‘Oh, Jesus! What for? You can’t tell me you enjoy looking after them. More than you enjoyed all this?’
Eliza looked round the room, the teeming, colourful, brilliant room, at the people who made her laugh and excited her and inspired her, the people who thought like she did, wanted what she did, cared about what she did, the people she felt she belonged with, and looked up at him very steadily.
‘Not exactly enjoy,’ she said, ‘no.’
‘So – why?’
‘Oh, Jack, I don’t know. I’m trying to be good. That’s all.’
‘Waste of a fucking life,’ he said, ‘if you ask me.’
When she got home, Matt was rather surprisingly still up, watching television.
‘Hello,’ he said. He looked at her rather warily. ‘Good time?’
‘Yes, very.’
‘You’re much earlier than I thought.’
‘Am I? Why are you still up? You said you were going to bed early.’
‘I know. I – just thought you might want to chat,’ he said, ‘when you got in. Tell me about it.’
‘Oh.’ She felt rather disoriented suddenly. This wasn’t like him.
‘You must – you must miss it,’ he said, slightly aggressively. ‘I do realise that. I’m not completely stupid.’
‘Oh,’ she said again. Her sense of disorientation increased.
‘I mean – well, I can see it’s a struggle for you. Sometimes.’
‘Yes. It is actually,’ she said. ‘An awful struggle.’
‘Yeah. Well, I just wanted to say that. Let you know I know. And that I – I appreciate it.’
‘Oh, Matt,’ said Eliza, sitting down beside him, her eyes filling with tears, ‘that is just the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.’
‘Blimey! I don’t do very well, in that case. I do love you, you know,’ he said suddenly. ‘I really, really love you. More than you might think.’
‘And I love you,’ she said, ‘more than more than you might think.’
‘That’s OK then. Shall we – you know, shall we go to bed?’
‘I think that’d be a very good idea,’ she said.
It was at times like this that she knew why she had married him.
Sarah knew she looked dreadful. She felt dreadful too. Odd. Frightened. She was still sleeping badly, still waking every two hours with a jump of fear that Adrian might be calling for her, need her. That she could turn over and go back to sleep seemed – for the time being – an unutterable luxury. Of course she missed him, missed him physically and emotionally, and the house seemed vast and silent – ah, the house. What was she to do about the house? She would have to leave it now; she had no excuses any more. Adrian had left nothing, except some minor debts. She had a tiny pension, what was left from a very handsome portfolio bequeathed her by her father, and the state pension of course. Which would be sufficient to feed and clothe her and fill her car with petrol and pay the electricity bill and feed the Aga; but no more. In the winter the house would be freezing again and she would be living in terror of burst pipes.
She often thought now she was as pathetically poor as anyone living in the council houses in the village – probably more so, and drew a certain amusement from it; but at least the council house tenants could stay in their homes, and the council would fix their roofs. No one would do that for her, the lady of the manor.
No, it had to go; she would see the trustees, see what they would suggest. Not a lot, she feared. But someone had to do something: she was living in an unaffordable prison.
Eliza, flushing and flustered, had said she knew Matt would do more building work, and had even hinted that they could make Sarah another loan; but equally flustered, Sarah had refused absolutely.
‘I can’t and won’t live off you, darling, however kindly the offer is meant, and I can’t stay here on my own, it’s quite impracticable. None of us can afford to look after Summercourt as it requires; we just have to be brave about it. We’ve enjoyed it for a long time, and now it must be someone else’s turn. We’ll find someone who deserves her, don’t worry.’
And she smiled brilliantly at Eliza and said why didn’t they take Emmie for a walk, before it got dark.
Eliza thought she had never admired her so much.
A meeting with the trustees and Sarah, Charles and Eliza was arranged for a fortnight’s time. ‘Will you come, Matt?’ said Eliza. ‘I’d so like you to be there.’
‘I’ll see. What’s the date? No, sorry, got a big meeting at Slough that afternoon.’
‘Can’t you change it?’
‘No, I can’t. You’ll be fine with Charles. Besides, I might say something inappropriate.’
‘Like what?’
‘Like I thought putting in modern windows would be a really good idea. Help to sell it, even.’
‘Oh, do shut up,’ said Eliza. ‘You never let anything go, do you? Anyway, it can’t be sold, that’s the whole point, you know it is. Somehow they’ve got to find someone who satisfies the terms of the trust. And there just isn’t anyone.’
‘Sounds like a very badly thought-out trust to me. As I’ve said before.’
‘I know, I know. But there must be some way. The lawyers will just have to find it.’
‘Not a lot of use, lawyers, in my experience. One of the reasons my business does what you might call moderately well is having as little to do with them as possible.’
‘How well does it do?’ asked Eliza suddenly. ‘I mean, how much money have you got?’
‘Why do you ask?’
‘Well – I just thought – I mean, we never actually discussed—’
‘Oh no,’ he said, ‘oh no, I’m not putting my hard-earned cash into that mausoleum. The words good after bad come to mind. And besides, if I did, I’d almost certainly want to do all sorts of things you wouldn’t like. No, sorry, Eliza, I’ll help do up some little place for your mum, course I will, but that’s the limit.’
‘Yes, all right,’ said Eliza sadly.
Charles said he would buy them all lunch on the day of the meeting. ‘I’ve booked a table at the Savoy, give Mummy a bit of a treat.’
‘That’s very kind. Can you afford it?’
‘Eliza, I want to do it. OK?’
Eliza woke up feeling almost frightened.
‘I feel as if a great piece of myself is somehow going to be taken away from me,’ she said to Matt at breakfast. He told her not to be so melodramatic.
‘It’s only a house,’ he said, getting up and giving her a brief kiss. ‘You’ve got to remember that. I know that’s not how you see it, but that’s the fact. Got to go now. See you tonight. Does your mum want to come and stay here? You could show her the Fulham house tomorrow, cheer her up a bit.’
‘I don’t think anything to do with a house would cheer her up,’ said Eliza with a sigh.
‘No? OK. I’ve been thinking. I wouldn’t mind getting somewhere a bit out of town myself. Lot better for Emmie than Fulham. Brownlow’s got some lovely developments going up in Surrey. Detached, big gardens, double garage, all mod cons.’
‘Matt—’
‘Yeah, private roads, no riff-raff. We’d get a very good price. I’ve got some brochures here, have a look at them. The best ones have got swimming pools. Emmie’d love that, you know how she enjoys the water.’
‘I don’t want to look at the horrible brochures for Roderick Brownlow’s horrible houses,’ said Eliza, ‘they make me feel sick. And how you can present them to me on a day like today, I really don’t know.’
‘Why not? I thought it might cheer you up. You’re always saying children should be brought up in the country.’
‘Surrey is not proper country,’ said Eliza coldly. ‘And I won’t have Emmie growing up thinking it is.’
‘No? Pardon me for living, as Ringo so memorably said. Right, I hope the meeting goes well.’
Eliza dropped Emmie off with Sandra and then went to the Savoy; Charles was waiting for her, looking rather irritable.
‘Where’s Mummy?’
‘She’s not coming. Going to meet an old friend instead. There was a message with the front desk here when I came in.’
‘Oh. How annoying.’
‘It is a bit. I planned this so carefully too. As a treat for her.’
‘Never mind,’ said Eliza, ‘we can have a nice lunch. It is very unlike her though. Well, she’s not herself. We can’t expect her to be. How are things, Charles? You look much better, I must say.’
‘I feel it. And I’ve got a job in a nice little prep school near Esher. Start at half-term. I’m looking forward to it. So apart from paying off millions to the Judds—’
‘Are you really?’
‘Well, not millions. Thousands though.’
‘It’s so unfair,’ said Eliza.
The meeting was set for three. When they arrived, they were greeted by Digby Ward, the manager of the trustee department. If you had asked a casting director, Eliza thought, to find you someone to play the manager of the trustee department of a private bank, Digby Ward would have been your man, He was tall, white-haired, slightly over-gracious in his manner, wearing morning dress, and with a habit of rubbing his hands together repeatedly as he spoke.