Believing the Lie (35 page)

“I’m not a butt fucker,” he screamed. “Keep your fucking hands off me. You hear me? Find someone else.”

Kaveh watched him. He was breathing hard and so was Tim, but something came over his face and what it was not was what Tim wanted it to be, which was hurt, devastation, destruction.

Kaveh said, “Of
course
you’re not, Tim. Did you think you might be?”

“Shut up!” Tim yelled in reply. He turned and ran.

He left Kaveh sitting in Bryan Beck, water to his waist, watching him run.

GREAT URSWICK
CUMBRIA

Manette had managed to get the tent raised by herself. It hadn’t been easy and although she had always been excessively competent when it came to anything that required her to follow instructions, she hadn’t done her usual perfect job with erecting the poles and the canvas, not to mention plunging the stakes into the ground, so she reckoned the whole thing would collapse on her. But she crawled inside anyway and sat Buddha-like in the opening, facing the pond at the bottom of the garden.

Freddie had knocked on her bathroom door and said he needed to speak with her. She’d said of course and could he give her a few minutes. She was just…whatever. He hurriedly said
absolutely
as if
the last thing he wanted to know was what she was doing in the bathroom and who could blame him, really. There were some forms of intimacy that were far too intimate.

She hadn’t been doing anything. She’d been killing time. She’d sensed something was going on with Freddie when they’d met at the coffeemaker midmorning. She’d come down from her room; he’d come in from outside and since he’d entered wearing what he’d been wearing the previous day, she knew he’d spent the night with Sarah. Wily one, that Sarah, Manette reckoned. She knew a gem when she saw it.

So when Freddie asked to speak with her, she reckoned the boom was going to fall. He’d seen in Sarah a potential to be the One or perhaps, Manette thought wryly, the Two, since she herself had been the One. At any rate, he probably wanted to bring her home this very night or move her into the house soon, and she wondered how she was going to cope with that.

Obviously, they’d have to sell the house and go their separate ways. She didn’t want to do that because she loved this place. Not so much the house, which, admittedly, was rather pokey, but this particular little spot that had been her haven for years. It was, indeed, all about the place itself and having to leave it…this disquiet she was feeling. It was about the silence of Great Urswick, about the canopy of stars that hung above the village at night. It was about the pond and the resident swans that floated placidly on it and only occasionally went after an overly enthusiastic dog who stupidly tried to chase them. And it was about the old paint-flecked rowing boat tied to the dock and the fact that she could take it out onto the water and watch the sunrise or the sunset or sit in the rain if she wanted to.

She supposed it was really all about roots, having them planted somewhere and not wanting them to be torn out because transplanting often killed the plant and she didn’t know what it was going to feel like when she herself had to move on.

This wasn’t about Freddie, she told herself. This wasn’t about Sarah or any other woman Freddie might finally choose. How could it be when she herself had been the one to bring up the spark and
how they had lost it, she and Freddie? It was absolutely, utterly, and irrevocably gone and didn’t he agree with her, at heart?

Manette couldn’t recall the expression on Freddie’s face when she had initiated this painful conversation. Had he disagreed? She couldn’t remember. He was always so bloody
affable
about everything. It should have come as no surprise to her that he’d been equally affable about the idea that their marriage was as dead as roadkill. And she’d been relieved, then. Now, however, she couldn’t remember why on earth she’d been so relieved. What had she been expecting of marriage, after all? High drama, sparks, and falling all over each other like randy teenagers every night? Who could sustain that? Who would want to?

“You and Freddie?” Mignon had said. “
Divorcing?
You’d better have a long look at what’s out there these days before you take that step.”

But this wasn’t about trading Freddie in for a different model. Manette had no interest in that. It was just about being realistic, about looking squarely at the life she had and evaluating its potential for going the distance. As they’d been—best friends who occasionally made the time for a pleasant encounter between the sheets—they hadn’t stood a chance of lasting. She knew it, he knew it, and they’d had to deal with it. That was what they’d done and they’d both been relieved to have it out in the open. Hadn’t they?

“Here you are. What the devil are you doing out here, old girl?”

She roused herself. Freddie had come to find her, and he bore in his hands two mugs. He squatted by the tent opening and handed one over. She began to crawl out but he said, “Hang on. I’ve not been inside a tent in years.” He crawled in to join her. He said, “That pole’s going to go down, Manette,” with a nod in the general direction of the troublesome part of the structure.

She said, “I could tell. One strong gust of wind, and it’s over. Good place to think, though. And I wanted a trial run.”

“Not at all necessary,” he said. He sat next to her, Indian style, and she noted he was flexible enough to do the same as she: His knees went all the way to the ground, not like some people who couldn’t manage that because they were far too stiff.

She took a sip of what he’d brought her. Chicken broth. Interesting choice, as if she were ill. She said, “Not necessary?”

“Decamping,” he said, “if you’ll pardon the pun. Deciding upon the out-of-doors just in case.”

She frowned. “Freddie, what are you talking about?”

He cocked his head. His brown eyes seemed to twinkle at her, so she knew he was joking about something and she hated not to be in on the joke. He said, “You know. The other night? Holly? That was a one-off. Won’t happen again.”

She said, “You giving it up or something?”

“The dating? Good God, no.” And then he blushed that Freddie blush. “I mean, I’m rather enjoying it. I’d no idea women had become so…so forthright in the years I was out of action. Not that I’d ever really been
in
action.”

“Thank you very much,” she said sourly.

“No, no. I didn’t mean…What I
did
mean is that you and I, having started so young, having been together from the word go, more or less…You were my first, you know. My only, as a matter of fact. So to see what’s going on in the real world…It’s an eye opener, I can tell you. Well, of course you’ll see for yourself soon enough.”

She said, “Not sure I want to.”

“Oh.” He was silent. He sipped his chicken broth. She liked the fact that he’d never made any noise when he sipped. She loathed the sound of people slurping, and Freddie, for one, had
never
slurped. “Well. Anyway.”

She said, “Anyway yourself. And I have no right to ask you not to bring women home, Freddie. Never fear. A heads-up would be nice, though. A phone call when she goes to the ladies or something, but even that’s not compulsory.”

“I know that,” he said, “the thing about rights and the like. But I also know how I’d feel if I came downstairs and found some bloke dipping into a bowl of cornflakes in the morning. Bit odd, that. So mostly I’ll be suggesting we meet off the beaten track, not round here. You know.”

“Like Sarah.”

“Like Sarah. Right.”

Manette tried to read something in his voice, but she wasn’t able to. She wondered if she’d ever actually succeeded in reading his voice at all. It was odd to think of it, but did one ever really know one’s spouse? she wondered, and then she brought herself up short and moved away from the thought because what Freddie wasn’t and hadn’t been for quite a while was her spouse.

After a moment of silence broken by the sound of ducks honking from the air above them, Freddie said, “Where’d this come from, anyway?” in reference to the tent. “It’s new, isn’t it?”

She told him about her plans for the tent: camping with Tim, walking the fells, ending up on Scout Scar. She ended with, “Let’s put it this way: He didn’t enthuse when I suggested it.”

“Poor kid,” was Freddie’s response. “What a life he’s been having, eh?”

That was putting it featherlike, she thought. What in God’s name was going to happen to Tim? To Gracie? To their world? She knew that if the situation in her life were different, she and Freddie would take them. She’d have made the suggestion and Freddie would have said of course, without a second thought. But she could hardly ask that of Freddie now and even if she could, she could hardly bring the children into a home where they might stumble into a strange woman walking the hallway at night in search of the loo because even if Freddie said he wouldn’t be bringing Sarah or Holly or whomever else home for a trial run, there was always a chance that in the heat of the moment, he’d forget that promise. She couldn’t risk it.

Out on the pond, the two resident swans came into view. Majestic and tranquil, they seemed to move without effort. Manette watched them and next to her she felt Freddie doing the same. He finally spoke again, and his tone was thoughtful.

“Manette, I’ve begun dealing with Ian’s accounting programme.”

“I did notice,” she said.

“Yes. Well. I’ve found something there. Several things, actually, and I’m not sure what to make of them. To be frank, I’m not sure whether they’re important at all, but they need sorting out.”

“What kind of things?”

Freddie moved to face her. He looked hesitant. She said his name and he went on with, “Did you know your father financed everything having to do with Arnside House?”

“He bought it as a wedding gift for Nicholas and Alatea.”

“Yes, of course. But he’s also paid for the entire renovation. And it’s been expensive. Extremely expensive, as these things generally are, I suppose. Have you any idea why he’s done that?”

She shook her head. “Is it important? Dad has gobs of money.”

“True enough. But I can’t imagine Ian didn’t try to talk him out of tossing so much Nick’s way without some sort of scheme for repayment, even if the repayment was to take a century and be made without interest. And it wouldn’t have been like Ian not to have documented something like that. There’s also the not-so-small matter of Nick’s past. Handing so much money over to an addict…?”

“I doubt Dad handed him the money, Freddie. More likely he just paid the bills. And he’s a former addict, not a current addict.”

“Nick himself wouldn’t say
former
. That’s why he takes such care about going to his meetings. But Ian wouldn’t have known that and he wouldn’t have thought
former
. Not with Nick’s history.”

“I suppose. But still…Nicholas stands to inherit
something
from Dad. Perhaps their arrangement was for him to enjoy his inheritance now, for Dad to see him enjoying it.”

Freddie didn’t look at all convinced. “D’you know he’s also been paying Mignon an allowance for years?”

“What else is he supposed to do? She’s had him by the short hairs ever since she fell at Launchy Gill. Honestly, you’d think Dad pushed her. He probably should have done.”

“The monthly payments have increased recently.”

“Cost of living?”

“What sort of cost of living does she have? And they’ve increased a lot. They’ve doubled. And there’s no way Ian would have approved of that. He had to have protested. He had to have argued not to do it at all.”

Manette considered this. She knew Freddie was right. But there were matters concerning Mignon that he’d never understood. She
said, “She’s had that surgery, though. It wouldn’t have been on the NHS. Someone would have had to pay and who else besides Dad?”

“Those payments would have been made to the surgeon, wouldn’t they? These weren’t.”

“Perhaps they were made to Mignon so that she could pay the surgeon herself.”

“Then why keep making them? Why keep paying her?”

Manette shook her head. The truth was: She didn’t know.

She was silent. So was Freddie. Then he sighed and she knew something more was coming. She asked what it was. He took a slow breath.

“Whatever happened to Vivienne Tully?” he said.

She looked at him but he wasn’t looking back. He was instead focused on those two swans on the pond. She said, “I’ve absolutely no idea? Why?”

“Because for the last eight years, regular payments have gone to her as well.”

“Whatever for?”

“I haven’t a clue. But your father’s actually been bleeding money, Manette. And as far as I can tell, Ian was the only one who knew.”

CHALK FARM TO MARYLEBONE
LONDON

Barbara Havers was indulging in a snack when Angelina Upman and her daughter knocked on her door. The snack was a blueberry Pop-Tart with a side helping of cottage cheese—one needed to address at least three food groups with every meal, and this seemed to wander in the general direction of more than one food group as far as she was concerned—and Barbara crammed the rest of the pastry into her mouth before she answered the door. She could hear Hadiyyah’s excited voice outside, and it was better to look virtuous with cottage cheese rather than despicable with a Pop-Tart, she reckoned.

She was also smoking. Hadiyyah took note of this. One look past Barbara and she was tapping her foot at the sight of the fag smouldering in an ashtray on the table. She shook her head but said nothing. She looked up at her mother, the virtuous nonsmoker, as if to say, You see what I’m dealing with here?

Angelina said, “We’re messengers bearing both good news and bad news. May we come in, Barbara?”

God no, Barbara thought. She’d so far managed to keep Angelina out of her hovel and she’d intended to keep things that way. She’d not made the daybed, she’d not done the washing up, and she had five pairs of knickers drying on a line that she’d jerry-rigged over her kitchen sink. But really, how could she step outside into the November cold to see why Angelina and her daughter had appeared on her doorstep instead of doing what Angelina herself would have done, which was open the door wide, offer coffee and tea, and be gracious to the unexpected caller?