The Grace Girls (55 page)

Kirsty decided to take a chance. ‘Are you talking about your little boy?’

He nodded. ‘I suppose I am.’

‘Do you mind me asking what happened?’ she probed, very tentatively.

‘I wish I could answer that, Kirsty,’ he said. ‘I wish I knew what happened myself – how the shrewd careful businessman
that nobody would get one over on, suddenly made the most basic mistake of all.’ He took a long drink of his whiskey and then the story poured out. ‘Have I
told you that I own a bit of property around Hamilton and Motherwell?’ he asked her.

Kirsty couldn’t remember if he had mentioned it. She paused, dredging her memory. Larry continued without waiting for an answer. ‘The two McCluskey sisters came looking to rent a house I owned out in Motherwell, and that’s how I first met them. Their parents were moving to Australia to live beside a brother and they didn’t want to g
o, so they needed to find a place of their own. They seemed nice enough and everything – and obviously they’re smart, good-looking women – so it was easy enough
to become friendly with them.’ He ran his fingers through his dark hair. ‘Helen was very interested when she discovered I was in the music business, with her being a singer, so she got me to introduce her to people involved in musicals.’ He shook his head now, obviously not enjoying reliving the story. ‘I used to run her back and forward to rehearsals, help to organise her costumes, that kind of thing.’

‘The same way you’re helping me and running me around in the car?’ Kirsty said, raising her eyebrows.

Larry nodded. ‘I suppose you could say it was a similar kind of arrangement.’ He looked her straight in the eye now. ‘Except the people involved were very different . . . I’ve discovered over the months that you’re not a bit like Helen McCluskey.’

Kirsty sat up straight in her chair now, not sure how to take his comment. She knew of course the two sisters were very different to her, but she didn’t know if this meant that she was better or worse.

‘You’re a much more honest, direct person,’ he said, as though reading her thoughts. ‘And when we started going out together, I didn’t realise she already had somebody e
lse.’ He sighed now. ‘A married man that she’d been seei
ng for years.’

‘What happened?’ Kirsty gasped. She pressed her finger
s to her mouth.

‘I was totally stupid,’ he said, giving a wry grin. ‘Your typical thick Dubliner who didn’t see what was staring him in the face. She got me over to the flat for a meal one night and persuaded me to stay – not that I needed a lot of persuasion.’ He shrugged. ‘I was never in love with her. She wasn’t bad-looking and she was nice enough – but she wasn’t the kind of girl you could talk to, and she definitely wasn’t the kind of girl I had envisaged ever being seriously involved with. She was just OK . . .’

‘But you were obviously
very
involved with her,’ Kirsty pointed out. She wanted to know more, even though it was painful listening to it all. She had to know
exactly
the kind of person Larry Delaney was.

‘I’m not denying it,’ Larry said, shrugging. ‘And it was stupid of me not to imagine where it might lead. I’m not blaming her entirely, but the next thing I knew she was pregnant and she was declaring me the father.’ He shifted his gaze now, as if he was talking to a spot about a foot above Kirsty’s head. ‘The last thing I could handle was the thought of abandoning a poor kid. So I offered to marry her and we set a date and all the rest of it . . .’

Kirsty finished the last mouthful from her glass. ‘Did you actually get married?’ she asked in a low flat voice.

‘No.’

Kirsty felt a flutter of relief. At least she hadn’t been making a fool of herself over a married man. That would have been the very worst.

Larry gave a deep, weary sigh. ‘She suddenly said that it wasn’t fair to me, that she knew I didn’t love her in the way that I should to get married, and she suggested that we leave it for a while – wait until the baby was born and then see what happened. So it went on and on. I moved her into a bigger place of her own before David was born, and I sorted her out with a car and everything she needed for the baby. All the things I’d dreamed that I’d do if I was ever lucky enough to have a family of my own.’

‘It sounds as though you couldn’t have done any more,’ Kirsty whispered. ‘She was blidey lucky compared to a lot of girls.’

‘I know I shouldn’t really be telling you this, Kirsty,’ he said now, his voice rough and croaky, ‘but I feel you might understand things – understand me – a small bit better if I do explain it. It just feels important to me that you should understand it . . . I don’t want you thinking bad of me.’

‘I don’t think bad of you . . . and I appreciate you telling me all this,’ she said. Then, before she could stop herself, s
he suddenly stretched her hand out to cover his. As thoug
h he was the young person and she the older, experienced one. And he didn’t move. He actually moved his hand so their fingers were entwined tightly together.

‘We only slept together a couple of times . . . we both could feel we had nothing in common apart from the baby. And even after David was born, there was still something huge missing between us.’ He halted. ‘Maybe if I’d been brought up differently I might have had different expectations of family life – I might have realised that we would never have made a decent couple no matter how hard I tried. The only good thing about it all was David – from the very first minute I saw him, I loved him completely. So I just kept waiting and waiting, thinking that things would change and we’d all somehow manage to be a happy family together.’ He gave a small, bitter laugh. ‘But of course it never happened. It never could have happened. You can’t make things happen just by wishing for them.’

‘So when did it all finish?’ Kirsty asked in a low voice, squeezing his hand in encouragement.

‘When David was about three years old the married man came out of the woodwork,’ Larry said now, rubbing a hand across his face. ‘He’d left his wife, and the next thing I knew was that Helen was sitting me down and telling me that she wasn’t sure if I was really David’s father or not. That there was just the tiniest chance he was the other fellow’s.’

‘Oh my God!’ Kirsty said, biting her lip. ‘That’s just absolutely terrible . . .’

He let go of her hand now, and then he looked at her. ‘I su
ddenly don’t seem all that smart and businesslike now, Kirsty, do I?’ He gave the same bitter laugh. ‘I think you’re probably shocked to know that older, supposedly mature men can make complete eedjits of themselves, aren’t you?’

‘I’m not thinkin’ anything like that at all,’ Kirsty said s
oftly. ‘I’m just sorry to hear you’ve gone through all that . . .
I really am.’

‘I was a bloody fool,’ he told her. ‘And there are times when I’m still a bloody fool.’

‘How d’you mean?’ she asked.

‘Well, David’s nearly four now,’ he said, ‘and I’ve never fou
nd out whether he’s rightly mine or not. Helen’s moved in with the other fellow now, and they’re suppose
dly getting married as soon as his divorce comes through.’

‘So where does that leave you?’

‘Nowhere, I suppose,’ he replied. ‘I haven’t seen the little lad for ages, and maybe I should just give up . . . maybe it would be better for him if I just faded off the scene and let them get on together. He doesn’t need anything from me now, the other fellow has plenty of money and they won’t go short of anything.’

Kirsty gave a shiver now, suddenly realising that the heating had gone down in the bar, and also that they were the only two left sitting in the entire place. She shifted in her chair, feeling achy and stiff from sitting in the one spot so long. ‘I think I’d better move and find this room.’ She got to her feet, then ran her hands over the blue satin dress that Larry had bought Helen McCluskey, straightening out the creases.

Larry drained his glass. ‘Let’s go, Miss Grace,’ he said in a surprisingly cheerful voice. ‘Or the next thing we know I’ll be pouring out the early part of my life to you as well, because I’ve just discovered something about you that I didn’t know . . .’

Kirsty’s heart leapt. ‘What?’ she said eagerly. At last he was treating her like a grown woman. She swept her blonde hair back over her shoulder and waited.

‘I’ve discovered that you’re a very, very easy person to talk to, and a very good listener. Many people are good at talking but few are good at listening.’

‘Well, that’s nice to hear,’ Kirsty said, although she wasn’t quite sure if it was the kind of compliment she’d dreamed about getting from him. Being an easy person to talk to wasn’t exactly the sort of thing that a girl wanted to hear. She would by far have preferred him to tell her how lovely she was and how devastatingly attractive he found her.

Larry went out to the car to retrieve his hold-all while Kirsty went across to the dressing-room to get her own things. He was standing in the foyer waiting for her, bag in hand, his black hair and suit liberally sprinkled with melting snowflakes.

‘It’s worse, if possible,’ he told her. ‘The car’s comple
tely covered over; I’m going to have to shovel it out of the snow in the morning.’ He laughed and pointed to her bag. ‘I’m glad you brought your ordinary clothes with you, you would have looked a bit silly helping me to dig out the car in an evening dress and high heels!’

Kirsty made eyes at him to signal her annoyance and then she swung the carrier bag in his direction and they both went down the corridor towards their rooms, trying to laugh quietly so they didn’t waken the other guests.

Kirsty looked at the numbers on all the doors, wondering
who the well-off people were who could actually afford to pay for a dinner dance
and
a hotel room in the financial dip that always hit everyone she knew after Christmas.

Rooms nine and ten were the last two rooms at the bottom of the corridor, just before it veered off to the left where there was another longer corridor.

‘I presume the rooms are all the same,’ Larry said in a low voice. ‘But if there’s any difference you get to choose. Women always need the bigger spaces.’

Kirsty smiled and held out the carrier bag holding her jumper, jeans and boots. ‘Well, I’m not exactly prepared for a
big hotel room. I think one wee chair will hold ever
ything I’ve got.’

He stopped at number nine and put the key in the door. A waft of warm air hit them immediately.

‘Thank God it’s not cold,’ Kirsty said, walking in. ‘At least I won’t need to go to sleep in my jumper and jeans.’

She looked around at the big double bed with the wine and blue bed cover that matched the curtains and the fabric on the dressing-table stool and lovely old-fashioned chair that re­­minded her of the sofa in her Auntie Claire’s.
‘It’s gorgeous!’ she said, putting her bags down on the floor. She went over to peek out of the window to see the snow-covered main gardens at the front of the hotel then she moved over to sit on the bed and gently bounce up and down
on it. ‘I bet you’ve stayed in loads of hotel rooms, haven’t you?’

Larry inclined his head. ‘I suppose I have stayed in a good few over the years . . .’

‘Are they all like this?’ Kirsty asked, waving a hand around the room.

‘Some are,’ he said shrugging, ‘and some are different.’

Kirsty got to her feet. ‘Let’s see your room then,’ she said in a businesslike manner, putting her hand on his shoulder to turn him around towards the door.

The other room had twin beds with green bed-covers and curtains and a view of the white-covered car-park and back gardens from the window.

‘I think I’ll keep the room across the way,’ she told him. ‘It’ll be a change for me to stretch out in a nice big bed.’

Larry lifted his bag up on top of one of the beds then he unzipped it and checked the contents. ‘Brilliant!’ he said, smiling over at her. ‘I’ve got two clean shirts in it and a new toothbrush and toothpaste – so, Miss Grace, you can pick what you want.’

Kirsty put her hands on her hips. ‘Let me see the shirts,’ she said in a mock-suspicious manner.

Larry lifted out a perfectly ironed and perfectly folded smart white shirt with a pale blue pin-stripe running through it, then he dipped back into the bag and produced
a much thicker plaid shirt in cream with brown and green
– the sort of good casual shirt he would wear under a heavy woollen sweater.

Kirsty reached for the plaid shirt, recognising the expensive label from one of the Scottish tartan shops in Glasgow. It felt cold from having been in the boot of the snow-covered car. ‘This looks the cosiest,’ she told him, hugging the soft shirt tight to her chest to warm it up. ‘And I’ll take the toothbrush and toothpaste if you don’t mind? I couldn’t go to sleep without brushing my teeth.’

‘Take it, take it,’ he laughed. ‘I’m sure I’ll sort one out in the morning.’

She turned towards the door now, suddenly reluctant to leave him. Even though she knew he had no interest in her apart from her being a good listener. ‘Well . . .’ she said, hesitating at the door. ‘I’ll see you in the morning then . . .’

A small silence fell. ‘Will you be OK?’ he asked in a low voice, his eyes studying her.