The Love Letter (41 page)

Ros then started unpacking his bag in the kitchen, complaining that half his clothes were missing and the rest filthily covered with sand. ‘Your father knows I need everything back here clean and organised. I bet he let
somebody else
pack this.’

Seeing Nico’s miserable face, Daisy hurriedly tried to explain, ‘Actually
I
packed it because I took it to Devon by mista—’

But Ros was on a roll. ‘Will has no
idea
what it’s like to scrimp and save for clothes.’

‘He does!’ Nico defended. ‘Daddy has holes in all his clothes because he can’t afford new ones.’

‘Rubbish. That’s because he’s scruffy. He was always getting
holes in his clothes when we were married, but unlike
some
people, I used to take the time to mend them for him like any good wife would.’

Nico stormed up to his room and slammed the door.

‘Oh hell,’ Ros rubbed her face but made no move to follow, adopting her martyred expression as she continued sorting clothes to wash. Legs hovered nearby, uncertain whether to put the kettle on and offer sympathy, tell her sister off, or scarper. As usual, the kitchen floor was spotless, but she saw emotional eggshells everywhere as she crossed it to Ros’s side.

‘Have you spoken to Dad at all?’ she asked carefully.

‘No,’ Ros had that clamp-faced look which said she was close to tears. She always missed Nico dreadfully during his weekends away, counted the hours until he came home, but these days the reunion was increasingly tense and embittered by her resentment at Nico’s growing independence.

‘Mum’s still in Farcombe …’ she ventured.

But Ros was focused entirely on the family microcosm in W5. ‘I think I’ll get Mum to drop Nicholas off and collect him next time that Will can’t do the run,’ she said tersely. ‘She never stays for more than a cup of tea. It isn’t good for him to have these long lunches with you there. It gives him a false sense of perspective.’

‘About what?’

‘Family life.’

‘But Will, Daisy and the girls are his family too.’

Ros said nothing, angrily unpairing two little socks and throwing them into the laundry skip.

‘Those ones are still clean,’ Legs pointed out kindly. ‘I didn’t wear the socks and pants.’

Ros carefully folded a pair of small Y-fronts featuring Darth Vader on the front. ‘How is Francis?’

‘Fine. He sends his love,’ she lied, knowing it would cheer up her sister.

Ros managed a tight smile. ‘Have you two made up your differences?’ She made it sound like two school friends reconciled after a playground brawl.

‘It’s a bit more complicated than that.’

‘Yesterday, I said a prayer that you two would get back together,’ she sighed. ‘I even lit a candle. Silly of me.’

Legs thought about the ring, still locked in the glovebox of the lovely new car parked proudly outside. In her head, she could still hear Daisy enthusing about them all raising their children in Farcombe, could see herself sitting back at the big, paper-strewn breakfast table in the hall, and she was suddenly shot through with sentimental overload. ‘Not so silly at all.’

‘I knew it!’ The Darth Vader pants were raised like a victory flag. ‘You must
fight
for him, Legs,’ Ros announced zealously, as though preaching from the pulpit. ‘Do whatever it takes to seek his forgiveness. Francis is everything you could ask for in a husband – financially secure, family oriented, faithful and honest. He has values that belong to our parents’ generation, and that’s so rare in men these days.’ She whisked away a tear with the Y-fronts.

Now was certainly not the time to break the news about their mother and Hector, Legs realised. But she knew she had to tell Ros about the offer on Inkpot Farm before she left. Will clearly hadn’t mentioned it when calling earlier to say that they were on their way, and her sister would be apoplectic if she heard it from Nico, being of the belief that the parents should discuss all ‘grown-up’ matters before children were informed.

To Legs’ alarm, her sister’s tears started to spill as soon as she learned Will and Daisy were taking their family to live in Spycove.

‘How
dare
they live there?’ Ros was distraught. ‘That means I can never go to Farcombe again, never show Nico all the places I used to play as a child.’

‘Of course you can,’ Legs soothed. ‘They lived there a few years ago, after all.’

‘But that was just temporary. Before …’ She couldn’t bring herself to elaborate on Will’s other children being conceived and born. ‘Farcombe should be neutral territory – a refuge for us all.’

Legs privately thought that if her sister had witnessed what she had this past weekend she’d never want to go to Spywood again, but she kept quiet. Instead, she determinedly stayed positive: ‘Don’t you see that this could really work out for you and Nico? You two can stay at the cottage for holidays, perhaps with Mum and Dad, and me too, and he’ll have his whole family around him.’

‘That,’ Ros glared at her, ‘is one of the most hurtful things you’ve ever suggested.’

Realising she’d misjudged the situation totally as usual, Legs apologised and retreated to her basement flat. She could hear Ros’s feet pounding upstairs before she had even closed the door.

Wearily, she unpacked her own case – Nico hadn’t taken advantage of any of her Browns weekend wardrobe, she noticed – and switched on her laptop to tackle her messages. Lots of neglected friends were queued in her inbox, complaining as always that she had no time for them since Conrad had sent her careering away from her social life. She knew she must appease them soon.

First she emailed Gordon:
Back in London. Have new (non-red) car thanks to lovely ex. Know you’ll approve! How’s Jimmy bearing up in the Carthusian order?

An automated out-of-office reply flew straight back saying that Gordon was no longer taking personal emails and all correspondence should be directed at his PA.

Reading it in alarm, conscience pricking, she emailed Kelly, carefully shrouding her mounting concerns about her boss’s overall wellbeing and his attitude to appearing at Farcombe with a cloak of assurances that she was dedicated to assisting with this first public appearance, and so it would help to have an indication of how he was currently feeling about it and any worries he might
have. She had no idea if Kelly was party to his long emails and live chats with her, but didn’t want to risk further indiscretion:
I’m sure you agree we all want to make this as stress-free a process as possible.
She fought an urge to add ‘ha ha’ in brackets before pressing send.

Then she called Conrad. Alone in his big Wandsworth house once again, he was far more forthcoming than in recent days, if no less concise.

‘So good to have you back,’ he growled. ‘Want to debrief my Legs in private. Come round tonight.’

‘I – um – not right now. I said I’d go round and see my father tonight,’ she lied. ‘But I can’t wait to see you tomorrow.’ She winced at her platitudes, and her Pavlovian eagerness to please, ever the teacher’s pet when it came to Conrad.

He accepted her excuse with unflattering complacency. ‘Sure. Wear something sexy tomorrow. Dinner after work. You stay here. We have a big week ahead.’ He rang off.

Stifling yawns, Legs repacked her washbag and a change of clothes into her weekend case. She had been suggesting to Conrad for months that she should leave a few spares at his place, but he always resisted, worried that his kids might find them and kick up a fuss. Now she found she dreaded the thought of going there again, like an enchanted cave that might entrap her. She wanted to turn tail and drive back to Farcombe instead.

Francis had sent a text.
Hope you got back safe.

It wasn’t exactly
Hamlet
this time, but she felt a hot glow of happiness nonetheless, replying.
Home safe. The car is truly lovely. Makes me think of you. X

Not sure how to take that,
he replied while she was changing into her running gear.
Want to talk?

He would want to know about her conversation with her mother, she realised, the thought of Adulteryhood hanging on her conscience. Being back in London and speaking with Conrad made her guilty head spin more than ever.

Later maybe. Need time to think. x

She pocketed the phone, pulled on her running gear and headed outside to pound her way towards the common. She hadn’t run this much in months. It was a sure sign of a troubled mind, she reminded herself. If her love-life didn’t sort itself out soon, she’d be joining Eddie Izzard on marathons, cracking jokes about blisters and SheWees.

The storm that had blown in across the Devon coast last night was buffeting west London now, its power reduced to a few electric crackles in the sky and a dark rain-cloud rumbling on the horizon somewhere near Hayes, but it was enough to make the park nearly deserted. Legs joined the hardy runners and late afternoon dog walkers lapping the windswept perimeter as she tried to sort out the muddle in her head. But all she could think about was Byrne saying ‘I am about to lose my life’ and that kiss which had turned hers upside-down.

Her brunch was still sitting like lead in her belly, giving her a stitch.

She stopped to rest by a bench, not caring that huge raindrops were starting to splash down on her.

Her phone was beeping with another message in her pocket.
Hope you’re thinking about me … or are you unblocking a sink?

Looking at it, she realised that she hadn’t locked the screen properly when setting off and it had rung through to Francis’s mobile as the last number she’d contacted. He must have picked up to be greeted by the sound of her panting non-stop.

Just running!
She hurriedly replied.

You’ve been running through my mind all day; fitting that you
should be running through my phone too. Hope you’re thinking hard about me
–
or should that be thinking about me hard?

Legs wiped a raindrop from her nose, face flaming in the knowledge that she hadn’t been thinking about him at all. Now he was text flirting. Badly. On balance, she preferred
Hamlet.
Cringing with shame, she sat on the bench in the rain, trying to think up a witty reply.

Only when she was soaked through did she abandon the notion and run home. She was struggling to find her Francis quandary funny. It just made her want to cry.

The glow of the television through the tall first floor windows told her that Ros and Nico had made up and were snuggling in front of a movie, no doubt indulging in a fresh batch of organic pizza, homemade lemonade and baby talk.

Legs took a long shower before raiding her fridge, which was looking decidedly barren, but managed to yield an unopened tub of pesto which she was soon tipping into a huge bowl of fusilli, cooked al dente because she was so hungry.

She wolfed it all so fast that she felt sick immediately afterwards, all pleasure in satiation stolen from her. She guessed it was like kissing Francis on the cliffs that first day back at Farcombe, a greedy pleasure she hadn’t earned, which had merely left her feeling spoiled and over-indulged. A fresh wave of guilt mixed toxically with her indigestion, giving her cramp.

Another text came through.
Any chance you could start thinking aloud? Just say the word …
He was getting impatient.

Lying on the floor with her legs up on her coffee table to ease her bloated stomach, she rang him. But if she’d been worried that he was going to come on too amorously, he quickly dispelled her fears by demanding: ‘What did your mother have to say about the Hawkes adopting Kizzy?’

‘I don’t think she knows any more than we do,’ she told him, relieved he wasn’t talking about her running through his mind. For a man who could quote Shakespeare sonnets from memory, he
had an alarmingly limited repertoire of chat up lines. ‘Have you found out where she went last night?’

‘No idea, but wherever it is I wish Jamie-go would bugger off there too. He tramped in here to see Poppy at teatime, smelling distinctly of horse, and they’ve been holed up in the green drawing room ever since. Édith suggested we puff ground almonds through the keyhole to flush him out.’

Legs chewed her lip, revolving thoughts of Byrne already so hardwired into her subconscious that her eyes seemed to project his face onto the ceiling.

‘They have a lot of talking to do.’ She carefully modulated her voice.

‘And sight-seeing, I gather. When Imee took cakes in there she overheard him trying to persuade Poppy to go somewhere with him tomorrow, but as we all know, she won’t budge from this house. Not that I blame her. There are press all over the place today, and a few diehard Ptolemy Finch fans have already started to turn up. I had to turf one lot off the parkland where they were erecting a tent. One of the press boys I was talking to said we could get as many as a hundred thousand here for Gordon Lapis’s first appearance. Surely that can’t be right?

‘His work is loved by millions worldwide.’

‘Good grief. I might let them camp here after all and charge twenty quid a night. I could buy you a Ferrari with the proceeds.’

‘No need. I
love
my car. I can’t tell you how much I love it.’