Between Friends (53 page)

‘
You will see me again Megan
,’ he had said. ‘
You have offended me and those who offend me do so at great risk to themselves so keep looking over your shoulder for I will be there, believe me
!’ And here he was, smiling and raising his hand in greeting like an old friend come to pay his last respects at the loss of another.

She whispered his name, her eyes huge with shock, remembering, the thoughts coming from nowhere, the fire which had started so mysteriously in the bar and the brakes, unaccountably faulty for some reason despite the fact that the motor car had been brand new. Twice she had passed over these occurrences, convincing herself it was no more than coincidence, an accident, a trick of fate, something which could have happened to anyone. The dog had raised the alarm when the fire broke out, another quirk of circumstance for he had wandered in that night belonging, it seemed, to no-one and the man who smiled at her now had not known of his existence. And the brakes! Had they been meant to kill, or just frighten? The latter, she suspected for her tormentor did not intend to give up this enjoyable game of revenge as easily
and
quickly as that. Dear God, how could she have been so artless, so incredibly foolish, her pounding heart demanded. It got no answer, for Megan Hughes slipped into a world of shadows, and had it not been for Tom and Martin who held her arms, one on either side of her, would have toppled to the ground.

In their concern the two young men did not see the older one slip away behind the trees and when Meg recovered from her surprising faint, he was in his hired hansom cab and half way back to Liverpool.

THEY SAT AROUND
the small oval dining table in the room Meg had set aside for their own use and the tension in the air was a living thing, snapping and snarling about the heels of the three of them. They had finished the lunch Meg had cooked, a simple meal of clear vegetable soup, fried whiting and one of Mrs Whitley’s vanilla creams since the kitchens did not yet allow for anything more exotic, and were sipping coffee. From somewhere beyond the closed door there was the sound of hammering, a voice imploring someone to ‘lift it clear, Alf, for God’s sake’ and the cheerful notes of Marie Lloyd’s popular song ‘The smartest girl in town’ being whistled slightly off key. The yellow dog which had come as a matter of course from ‘Hawthornes’ lay before the fire, his ears pricked, the movement of his eyes uneasy for he had caught the strange disquiet in the room and he was not awfully sure what to make of it.

The room was not large but there was a lack of clutter in it which gave it the appearance of being bigger than it was. It was on the corner of the house with deep windows on two walls. There were three comfortable armchairs grouped about the fire, covered in a cheerful print of cream and apricot. The carpet was smooth and deep, a plain rich coral and in the corner, placed between the windows was the rosewood dining table with four matching chairs. There were shelves filled with books, flowers and pretty ornaments on the plain, white-painted fireplace and cream curtains fell at each window. It was simple and comfortable, the first room in the house to be completed and all of it done by Tom from Meg’s design. He had done as much as he could in the garden until the better weather came, and so he had painted and lovingly restored woodwork, swept the chimney and when the carpet was laid and the furniture moved in, they at least had somewhere to escape the turmoil which lay about them. There were builders and decorators, plumbers and electricians, all combining to tear the place apart and put it together again as Meg
wanted
it. Tom slept on a camp bed in an attic room which was too high and too small to be considered for alteration though it would eventually house a maidservant and Meg ‘managed’, she said, as did Edie, in which ever bedroom some workman was not painting, or plumbing, or putting in endless miles of wiring to give them electricity. Each bedroom was to have it’s own bathroom and some a private sitting room. The dining-room and drawing-room, the small library, the cocktail bar, the billiard room, the small ballroom and the massive kitchens were to be the very peak of luxury and modern innovation and when it was complete the hotel, already advertising in the ‘best’ newspapers and periodicals was to be the finest in the north.

It was January. The low sun glittered on the heavy hoar frost which had come in the night, turning great patches of the sloping lawn to the colour and sheen of molten gold. The pines at the far side of the lake were etched, black and white and deepest green against a sky of palest blue, reflected in the absolute stillness of the water. There were small floating islands of frozen ice on the lake on which ducks struggled to keep upright, and just beginning to raise their heads beneath the protection of the trees were folds of exquisite snowdrops and the perky yellow heads of early crocus.

‘It seems to me it’s a sound investment, Tom.’ Meg’s hand smoothed a non-existent wrinkle in the damask table cloth. Her face was quite without expression but in her eyes was the clear light of exasperation and the rigid necessity to keep it in check, but her voice was patient.

She had grown thinner during the winter months since Mrs Whitley’s funeral and those about her begged her to slow down, to take a rest in the afternoon, have an early night for she worked eighteen to twenty hours in every twenty-four, convinced her loss of weight and appetite, her nervous explosive energy was caused by overwork but she took no-one’s advice. She wanted everything to be ready, to be
perfect
by the time the hotel opened at Easter, she said, telling no-one, least of all Tom and Martin of the apparition which had appeared before her at Mrs Whitley’s funeral. Had she
really
seen him, she agonised in the sleepless nights, or had her grieving mind conjured him up, dwelling as it had been on the past. He had frightened poor Mrs Whitley until she had been reduced to a nervous shell of her old self, and in the graveyard, beside the old lady’s open grave, could not she, Meg, have imagined up the ghost of the man who had almost killed the
old
lady all those years ago? It would not have been surprising if she had imagined him she reflected later for there had been no sign of him after the funeral and so, for the time being she had decided to keep what she had seen, or thought she had seen, to herself. What good would it do to tell Martin and Tom, or the police? It was no crime to attend a funeral and if she half believed that he had had a hand in the fire and the failure of the brakes, how could she prove it? They would think her demented, obsessed with the man whom she had twice seen put away because of her. Best leave it for now, keep her eyes open, be extra careful and see what happened, had been her decision and in three months she had begun to relax a little and to believe she had imagined the whole thing.

She continued to speak. ‘Martin has explained how it will work and though he, naturally will be the major shareholder, we will have 10 per cent and the rest will be sold to the public. It is the only way to raise money, you know that, surely? Such a large sum cannot be found by Martin alone but there will be dozens glad to get in on it. You know yourself, from Martin’s accounts, how strong the company is and how much forward business he has on his books in orders and bookings for flying lessons. This is a marvellous opportunity to get hold of the old gentleman’s share and if we don’t want it, the three of us, he will only let it go to others and Martin will lose control. He has only 45 per cent now and if he, or we, don’t acquire at least another 10 per cent he will be outvoted at every board meeting and …’

‘I know all that, Meg! You’ve told me a dozen times but bloody hell, we’re already in debt up to our eyeballs and the idea of raising a mortgage on “Hawthornes” means we’ll owe still more. And those investments we’ve made have brought us in a good return, haven’t they? To sell them now seems to me to be …’

‘We have to realise the cash, Tom. Tell him Martin.’

She turned to look at Martin. He was lounging quite carelessly in his chair which he had pushed back from the table, his long legs stretched out beside it and crossed at the ankle. He was watching his own hand as it toyed with a fork and the other was shoved deep in his trouser pocket. He wore a superbly cut pair of riding breeches, an affectation really for he had never sat astride a horse in his life, made of fawn corduroy. His knee length boots were highly polished, made from fine, soft leather and his jacket was of excellent cloth, a tweed in a pale shade of chocolate. His
thick
hair fell over his brown forehead in an untidy, engaging way and now and again he pushed his fingers through it impatiently as though the task he was about was not to his liking. He looked in every way a successful and expensive young gentleman of the privileged class.

‘Perhaps Tom would rather not be involved, Meg.’ It was a challenge and they were all aware of it. ‘He is right, of course. This
is
a gamble …’

‘Nonsense!’ Meg’s voice was crisp. ‘Oh, I agree, we are to put our money in an untried industry but you have only to look at the growth …’

‘Don’t tell me, tell Tom.’ Martin turned to look lazily, smoothly, at Tom and the tension increased for though it was tamped down tight, the awkward and growing conflict, spiky and hurtful, between the two men who had always been brothers, it pushed them ever so gently towards a confrontation, pulsing beneath smooth, masculine skin, slowly stripping away the strong bond which had held them together for twenty years. The fine hair cracks were widening at every encounter, not yet visible, but beginning to spread and undermine the very foundation on which their friendship was built.

The reason for it sat between them.

‘Go on, Martin,’ she said, ‘explain it properly so that we both can understand.’

Martin sighed sadly. He lowered his eyes again to the fork, his love for her hidden and deep, not from her since he was completely certain she had not forgotten the day, three months ago now, when Mrs Whitley had died, nor the unspoken commitment which had bound them together, but from the man who glowered suspiciously at him from across the table. He was well aware that should it have been anybody but himself who had put this business proposition to Tom and Meg, Tom would have grinned and shaken his hand and gone cheerfully back to his vegetable plot leaving the decision and planning and financial arranging to Meg as he had always done but not now, not now! They were no different with one another, not on the surface, and not one word had been said which Tom could take exception to, but he knew, Martin could sense it, that there was some variance, involving Meg, in their relationship. It cut him up in pieces, Martin knew, as it did himself, each time they met and he was beginning to wonder if perhaps it might be better if he looked elsewhere for
the
financing he needed, but he knew this was a business venture, a gamble perhaps, but it could not lose and he had put it to Meg as a matter of course, knowing she would see it, and wanting to share it with her. She was as astute as he in such matters. She knew him, and his worth and what he had already done and was shrewd enough to realise that there was profit to be had in this infant industry. The motor car and the aeroplane, they were the future of mankind and could not, must not fail!

‘“Hunter Automobiles” will form a subsidiary company, “Hunter Aviation” and the first, which is already showing a healthy profit will, as the word implies, subsidise the second. We are turning out a dozen motor cars a week and they are immensely popular. I could sell twice or three times that number, Tom. They are small, medium priced and increasingly easy to handle.’ He grinned amiably, determined if he could to take the look of foreboding from Tom’s face. ‘Why don’t you come to the field one day and try one … No! Well it’s up to you, of course, but really, take my word for it they are here to stay and you will be compelled to it one day. We are to model our production on the ideas of Henry Ford. He’s an American whose own aim is to build an automobile sufficiently low priced to sell to the mass market, simple and of good quality, reliable and easy to drive. Roads are improving at an enormous pace and the motor car is no longer considered a capricious toy for the rich. I aim to standardise what I produce, using what is called “mass-production” as Ford is doing but we need the machine work and the tools with which to develop it. But it is the aircraft which is my … my own concern now. I am to show mine, if she is ready at “Olympia” in the next show.’ His face softened and despite himself Tom felt drawn to that familiar compulsion which drew Martin on and on.

‘I’m to call her “Wren”,’ he said simply.

‘Oh Martin, why?’ Meg asked smilingly. ‘Why “Wren”? It is such an innocuous little bird.’

‘Have you not heard the fable of the Wren and the Eagle?’

‘Tell me.’ She leaned towards him and put her elbows on the table and her eyes were bright, alert and glowing with wonder.

‘The legend goes that in the bird world, the bird that mounted the highest in the air should be King. The Eagle laughed and soared majestically above all the others and was about to be acclaimed King when suddenly a trill of sound was heard and the Wren, who had been carried up on the Eagle’s back was seen to
be
fluttering above his head. So the little bird become King of the birds, not through strength but by being the most clever. My “Wren” will be King of the aircraft.’

‘Martin, that’s lovely!’ Delighted she took his hand and held it between her own.

Tom sprang up angrily. He could stand no more and his jealousy showed in his heightened colour and the narrowing of his vivid blue eyes. He strode about the pleasant room, his hands thrust deep in his trouser pockets. Each time he reached the wall, the window or the fireplace he turned about savagely, pushing aside furniture as it got in his way. He did not know what to do to hold it in and Meg could feel the very air strain against the pressure of his tension and she stood up and moved towards him, standing in his way as he made another violent turn about the room.