How to Find Love in a Book Shop (18 page)

He laughed, and began to read. He felt awkward at first, but he began to get into the story: a bunch of colourful characters vying for hearts and trophies. The room was warm, a bit stuffy, and after a while he could see Alice was falling asleep, so he stopped.

She opened her eyes as soon as he stopped.

‘I’m not asleep.’

‘Maybe you should go to sleep.’ He patted her.

She closed her eyes again. ‘That’s who you remind me of,’ she murmured.

‘Who?’

‘Jake Lovell. The gypsy boy. Everyone else at school loved Rupert Campbell-Black, but I always like Jake best. You remind me of him.’

‘Oh.’ Dillon looked down, not sure if this was a compliment.

‘It’s a good thing. Rupert Campbell-Black was a beast. But Jake was lovely.’

It was as if she was talking about real people. He closed the book and put it back on the bedside table.

‘I better go,’ he said. ‘Visiting time’s nearly over.’

‘You’ll come again, won’t you?’

‘Of course.’

He wasn’t sure whether to kiss her goodbye. She put up her arms.

‘Give me a hug. I need a big hug.’

He bent down and hugged her awkwardly.

‘You be good,’ he replied and walked out of the room.

As he left the hospital, he could feel himself clenching and unclenching his fists. He’d hated seeing her like that, obviously in pain but still so bloody brave. Hugh didn’t deserve her. But there was nothing he could do to stop the wedding. Even a smashed-up leg and a smashed-up face wasn’t deterring Alice.

Fifteen

The morning room at Peasebrook Manor was the prettiest room Emilia had ever seen. It had primrose yellow walls and pale green silk curtains and two rose velvet sofas in front of a dainty fireplace. Over it was a Victorian oil painting of a girl feeding cabbage leaves to a fat bunny rabbit. The girl, with her rosy cheeks and blonde hair, reminded Emilia of Alice.

Emilia wondered what it was like to live in the Basildons’ world. Not that hers was gritty reality – she was only too aware it was rarefied – but this was quintessential country life at its most appealing. This was the room where Sarah took tea or coffee with her guests, and wrote letters and saw to her business. She thought of the back office at the shop and resolved to make it a more pleasant place to work in. Her father had rarely spent time in there; just banished anything he didn’t want to look at into its depths. It was cold and damp and dingy. It would have to change.

Sarah came in with a tray bearing tea: a proper china teapot, and dainty cups and saucers and a milk jug and sugar bowl. And a plate of shortbread, thick with caster sugar. She laid it on the table between the sofas.

‘Milk?’ she asked, and Emilia nodded.

Sarah somehow managed to look dishevelled but devastatingly attractive. She must be in her fifties but looked far younger. She had on jeans and a faded Liberty lawn shirt and pale blue loafers. Her hair was a mixture of honey and grey that looked as if a top London hairdresser had painstakingly streaked it, but was probably the result of Sarah not having been to have her roots done for months. Her hands were red and chapped from gardening, and her nails ragged, but the most enormous diamond glimmered on her ring finger: it was so large it almost couldn’t be real, but Sarah wasn’t the type to wear costume jewellery. She wore no make-up but a dab of pink lipstick hastily applied in the downstairs loo just before she answered the door. She was the archetypal English rose.

‘I’ve just got back from visiting Alice,’ she said as she poured the tea. ‘The traffic out of Oxford was awful.’

‘How is she?’

Sarah sighed. ‘She’s in a lot of discomfort, poor thing. And of course all those painkillers make one so fuzzy. But she’s making progress.’

She sat down on the sofa opposite Emilia.

‘I asked you here because I wanted to talk to you about something your father and I had been discussing for a while.’

Emilia nodded. Sarah clasped her hands. She seemed slightly nervous, not quite meeting Emilia’s eye. She fiddled with the diamond ring. Her fingers were so slender it spun round and round.

‘We had become quite good friends, your father and I. We spoke – met – often.’ She lifted her gaze. ‘Ralph is not a great reader and it was good to have a decent conversation with someone about books. Julius was always so brilliant at recommending. He had a feeling for what I wanted to read and I don’t think there was one book he suggested that I didn’t love. Sometimes he’d make me read things because they were good for me and I always took something away from them. He widened my world …’

She drifted off, immersed in her eulogy.

‘He was extraordinary,’ she finished, and Emilia could see the glitter of tears in her navy blue eyes, as bright as the diamond on her ring.

‘I know,’ said Emilia.

For a moment, Sarah couldn’t speak. Emilia was touched. She could see how difficult Sarah was finding this. She was still astonished by how deep people’s feelings for her father ran. They still came up to her in the street or in the shop and told her how much he had meant to them.

‘I’d love to do something. To remember him by. He often talked about organising a literary festival. It was a dream of his and I’d suggested that we could do one here, at Peasebrook. We have so many rooms here that could be used. We were starting to think quite seriously about it when he became ill.’

Here, Sarah looked down at the floor. Emilia could see she was struggling.

‘He did mention the idea to me, once or twice,’ she said. ‘There are so many authors and celebrities within striking distance of Peasebrook, and we’re not so far from London. It could be a real draw. Especially in a setting like this.’

Sarah had recovered her composure. ‘Exactly! We felt we could attract a good calibre of speakers. The thing is, it was his dream, but it was starting to become a real possibility. We’re very well set up for putting on events here. And – and I think it would be a shame to let the opportunity slip. I thought about doing the festival in his name.’ She swallowed. ‘The Nightingale Literary Festival.’

‘Oh!’ said Emilia. ‘That would be a wonderful tribute.’

‘I would need your help, though. And the support of the shop. We’d need you to supply the books, of course. And advise on who to ask. I mean, there’s masses and masses to think about, but I wanted to see what you thought. Because I couldn’t do it without you. It would have to be a team effort.’

Emilia took a piece of shortbread and bit into it. It was a wonderful idea. She could see it all in her mind’s eye. Literary lions and lionesses holding forth in the ballroom, the audience hanging on their every word. A glittering programme; the Glastonbury of book festivals. It would be a wonderful boost for the town too – people attending the festival would want accommodation and would go into the pubs and restaurants. And they could get sponsorship from local businesses …

But she had to be cautious. She didn’t want to get Sarah’s hopes up. It was such an enchanting idea, but she couldn’t show too much enthusiasm.

‘The thing is,’ she said, ‘I’m not sure what I’m doing with the shop yet. I’m afraid it’s not in very good shape financially. It’s not making money at the moment: I’m struggling to cover my overheads. It needs a lot spending on it if it’s going to even begin to make a profit and I haven’t decided yet if that’s what I want to do.’

Sarah looked horrified. ‘You can’t let it close, surely?’

‘I don’t want to. Of course not. But I can’t just keep it going out of sentiment. That would be foolish. And I’ve got my staff to consider, as well as myself.’

Sarah considered her words. ‘I understand.’ She sighed. ‘Julius never mentioned the shop being in trouble.’

The way she said it gave Emilia the impression they spoke often, and that Sarah was hurt by his omission. She smiled. ‘I don’t think Dad quite saw that it was. It’s all a bit of a muddle. I’ve only scratched the surface. But he ran it by the seat of his pants, rather.’

‘So was he in debt?’

‘Nothing awful or to be ashamed of. But there are quite a few outstanding invoices.’

‘Gosh.’ Sarah looked perturbed. ‘He never implied he was in trouble.’

‘As I said, I don’t think he thought he was. My father’s famous line was
I don’t do numbers.
’

‘Oh dear.’ Sarah leaned forward. ‘Between you and me, I have rather more experience of getting out of hideous debt than you might imagine. A while ago now we nearly lost Peasebrook. I won’t go into it, but it was pretty frightening. So I understand how you feel. And if I can help at all …’

‘I have Andrea, my accountant – I was at school with her. She’s like a walking calculator in Louboutins. She’s been wonderful. But even she can’t wave a magic wand. I’ve got some tough decisions to make. And if I do go ahead, it’s going to be hard work. Not that I’m afraid of that, of course …’

‘It just goes to show you,’ said Sarah, ‘that you can think you know someone, but you have no idea.’ As she said it, her cheeks flushed pink. She put her face in her hands, and in that moment Emilia recognised that her father and Sarah must have been closer she realised. She wasn’t sure how she felt about this realisation. She liked Sarah very much, but there was no getting away from the fact she was very firmly married to Ralph. Should she press Sarah for more detail? Did Sarah
want
her to realise? She thought she perhaps she did. She had more than hinted.

Maybe today wasn’t the day. Everything was still a bit raw. They were feeling their way with each other. If they went ahead with the festival, and worked together, maybe the whole story would come out at some point, when they were both ready.

‘I think the festival is a wonderful idea,’ she said finally. ‘And if I do decide to stay open, I think we should do it. As you say, it would be a perfect memorial. My father would be proud.’

Sarah’s smile was a bit wobbly. ‘He would …’

Emilia put her teacup down. ‘I’ll let you know as soon as I’ve decided what I’m doing.’

There was a pause. Sarah was twisting her ring round again. Something unsaid was hanging in the air.

‘Emilia – there’s something I’d like to share with you. But it’s totally confidential. It can’t go any further.’

Emilia could see Sarah was struggling with what she was about to say.

‘Is it about you and my father?’ she asked gently.

There was a spot of colour on each of Sarah’s cheeks. ‘I loved your father. Very much.’

If she thought about it, she could still feel that love now. A burning heat that went into her very bones; a ball of warmth where her heart sat. They had never known what to do with their love. Acknowledging it in public would have taken them into another realm; a set of circumstances Sarah knew she couldn’t manage. Her duty was to her husband, her family and Peasebrook. She couldn’t compromise that duty. It wasn’t fair on anyone, but most of all it wasn’t fair on Julius. He protested that he didn’t mind, but Sarah did. She always felt terrible, that he had got the raw end of the deal, and that she was somehow having her cake and eating it.

But if she ever talked about ending it, which she did from time to time when the guilt gnawed at her in the darkness of dawn, he would pull her to him and kiss her. Oh, how they had kissed. Endless kisses that reached deep inside her. Was there anything more momentous, she wondered? To kiss someone so hard you could feel your soul fuse with theirs?

She wasn’t proud of her relationship with Julius, for it compromised the two men she loved. For she still loved Ralph in her own way, despite everything he had put her through. Though the two of them lived very separate lives they still had much in common, not least Alice. Never in a million years would she have walked out on what they had.

But she had needed Julius. She knew it was selfish, to carry on, even though he insisted it didn’t matter to him. As long as he could have a little bit of her, it didn’t matter to him.

She couldn’t explain all this to Emilia. Emilia was young. She wouldn’t understand the subtleties and compromises and dilemmas that came with later life. And she didn’t want to sully Emilia’s memory of Julius by making him out to be less than morally upright.

So she chose her words carefully.

‘I loved your father, but of course, I’m married, and he was very aware of that. He was a very understanding and considerate man. He respected my situation. But we became very close …’

She hoped what she was saying made sense. She wasn’t actually lying. She hadn’t denied anything as such. It was equivocation, if anything. She didn’t need to go into details about the intensity of what they had. The extraordinary passion, even if it had felt pure.

Emilia didn’t say anything for a while. When she finally spoke, her voice was gentle.

‘I’m glad,’ she said. ‘I’m glad he had someone as lovely as you. To care about him. To think about when he woke up in the morning.’ A tear slid out onto her cheek. ‘Sorry. It’s just … I miss him.’

She rubbed her eye with the heel of her hand. Sarah jumped to her feet. She could never bear to see anyone cry – it might be her duty to keep her emotions in check when it came to herself, but when it came to others, she was open and caring. She sat on the sofa next to Emilia and hugged her.

‘I miss him too,’ she said. ‘Dreadfully.’

‘I’m just glad he wasn’t lonely.’ Emilia’s voice wavered. She sounded like a small girl trying desperately not to cry harder. ‘I always worried that he was lonely. He was such a wonderful man. He deserved to be loved.’

‘Oh, he was loved. Be sure of that.’

Emilia leant into Sarah. It was wonderful to be comforted by someone who had loved her father.

‘Nobody knew about us, of course. We could never tell anyone. But I’m taking the risk of telling you because I think you’ll understand. And because I want you to know that I’m always here if you need me,’ Sarah told her. ‘I know Julius would have wanted me to look out for you. And if I can be of support, in any way, just let me know. Even if it’s just to talk about him. Or just to come up for tea. Or wine. Or anything. Anything.’

Emilia held Sarah’s hands and looked at her. She could see now the depth of the sadness in Sarah’s eyes. And she could feel the warmth and kindness that Julius must have been drawn to. And she was grateful to Sarah, for her compassion and honesty. It must have been a painful confession. She felt honoured to be trusted with the secret. She supposed when she had time to think about it, she might be shocked, but she wasn’t going to judge. She found it a comfort, that Julius had this woman’s devotion. And she knew, from all the books she had ever read, that life was complicated, that love sprang from nowhere sometimes, and that forbidden love wasn’t always something to be ashamed of.