The Real Katie Lavender (12 page)

The girl was the first to speak. ‘I only came here to check you out,’ she said. ‘I didn’t intend to announce who I was. I just wanted to see what kind of a man you were.’

Her frankness forced Stirling to say something. ‘You’re not catching me at a good time,’ he said.

‘I know. I gather someone’s died.’

He frowned. ‘How do you know that?’

‘The other waitress heard you talking to the two police officers who were here. Is it a member of your family?’

‘My brother.’ He flinched at hearing himself declare so casually that Neil was dead. You don’t know for sure yet that he’s dead, he wanted to shout back at himself. He could be alive. It could all be a terrible mistake.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘Was it an accident?’

Stirling cleared his throat. ‘It’s . . . it’s possible that he killed himself.’

‘Oh, how awful for him. And for you and his family. Did you have any idea he might do something like this?’

Her concern was like a punch to his chest. He caught his breath. ‘Not a clue.’

There was a silence between them. He simply didn’t know what else to say.

‘I haven’t come here to cause trouble for you,’ she said. ‘I’ll leave you in peace; it’ll be as if I’ve never been here.’

He swallowed. ‘Is that what you want?’

‘It’s probably what you want, isn’t it?’

‘I . . . I don’t know.’ He rubbed at the back of his neck. ‘I’m sorry, I’m not really thinking straight.’

‘I understand. Can I ask you something?’

‘Go ahead.’

‘Does your family know about me?’

‘No. My relationship with Fay was a secret.’

‘Except that can’t be true, can it? Your mother reacted quite strongly to my surname when she asked me what it was. And as you said, it was she who told you to talk to me.’

He almost smiled. ‘My mother is an exceptionally intuitive woman.’

‘And she never once let on to you that she suspected something?’

‘All I was aware of at the time was that she knew Fay and I had been close for a brief period. You know, the more I look at you, the more I realize you remind me not just of Fay but also of my mother when she was young. How is Fay? Does she know you’re here?’

‘She died a year ago. It was very sudden. A road accident.’

‘God, I’m sorry. And your father?’

‘He died three years ago.’

‘Do you have any brothers and sisters?’ Please God, he thought, having put his foot in it twice already, don’t let them be dead as well.

She shook her head. ‘I’m an only child. But I have some very good friends. They’re like family to me.’

The clatter of footsteps and voices had them both turning towards the back door. The two women who ran the catering business came in, then stopped in their tracks when they saw him. ‘Everything all right, Mr Nightingale?’ one of them asked. To his shame, he could never remember their names. Beryl and Lou, was it?

‘I . . . I came for some tea,’ he replied awkwardly, feeling he had to justify his presence in his own kitchen. ‘Perhaps . . . perhaps Katie could bring it up when it’s ready? I’ll be upstairs with my mother in the guest room, third door on the left,’ he added, looking directly at Katie.

He left the kitchen, knowing that he’d probably just made himself look obnoxiously high-handed by not offering to wait a few minutes longer so he could take the tea himself. But asking her to bring it up was the only way he could think to talk to her again without arousing suspicion.

Out in the hall, his wife was saying goodbye to a group of guests. When they’d gone, she stopped him at the foot of the stairs. He knew what was coming, knew too that Gina would feel slighted that he hadn’t been honest with her straight away. The truth was, he hadn’t been able to bring himself to utter the words. Strange then, that he had been able to do it just now in the kitchen. Thinking of the extraordinary encounter with that girl –
his daughter
– and the precarious position in which her appearance put him, his heart began to race.

‘Stirling,’ Gina hissed, ‘I’ve done what you asked, told people that Cecily’s not well and that the party’s over, but will you now kindly tell me what is really going on? Why were those police officers here? And where have Cecily and Pen disappeared to? Have they gone home?’

A vein in his head began to throb. He inhaled deeply, then let out his breath in one long rush. ‘The police were here because a body has been found at Medmenham and they think it’s Neil’s. They think it’s suicide. That he drowned himself.’

‘Suicide? Neil? But that can’t be right. Neil wouldn’t do something like that. It’s absurd. He’s a good swimmer, he wouldn’t be able to drown himself.’

‘It looks like he did. The police said there were pills and alcohol in the car.’

‘But why?’

Stirling felt he knew why, but again he couldn’t bring himself to say the words. Instead, he said, ‘We’ll have to wait and see.’

‘I don’t understand why you kept this from me,’ she said with a frown. ‘Why didn’t you tell me the truth?’

‘I didn’t want you to worry,’ he lied.

She tutted. And then her expression softened, as if only now grasping the reality of what he’d told her. ‘I’m so sorry, Stirling,’ she said. ‘Neil was so much more than just a brother to you.’ She put her arms out to comfort him, but he stepped away, rested a hand on the newel post of the stairs. He suddenly felt he couldn’t bear to be touched.

‘Would you do your best to get rid of anyone who still hasn’t left,’ he said. ‘Please don’t say anything about Neil; it’ll come out soon enough. For now it’s private, a family matter. If you need me, I’ll be upstairs with Pen and Mum.’

‘Of course, darling. Leave everything to me.’

He forced himself to smile his gratitude, to show he appreciated her support. His wife had always been so competent and steadfast. Admittedly she could be a little cold around the edges, but he’d always been able to rely on her to do the right thing. Though God knew how she would react to the news that currently he had a secret illegitimate daughter standing in their kitchen who he’d fathered in the early years of their marriage.

He took the stairs slowly, his legs weary and leaden. In the space of a few short hours his life had been turned upside down, and he had absolutely no idea how he was going to contain not just the fallout of Neil’s death and the fraud Rosco had uncovered, but the consequences of the child he’d never known showing up. She had said she hadn’t come here to cause trouble, but one thing he was convinced of: trouble most assuredly lay ahead.

He knocked on the door of the guest room, and at his mother’s response, he went in. She and Pen were sitting on the window seat, the curtains drawn. Pen was on the telephone; she wasn’t crying any more. Cecily got up and came over to him. ‘She’s talking to Lloyd,’ she said. ‘Where’s the tea?’

‘On its way. The waitress you told me to talk to is bringing it,’ he added.

They stared at each other.

‘And?’ Cecily said meaningfully.

‘How did you know about me and Fay?’ he asked without preamble, his voice low so that Pen wouldn’t hear.

‘Later,’ she said. ‘We’ll discuss that later. Do you know what you’re going to do about the girl?’

‘That’s up to her, isn’t it?’

Cecily’s eyes narrowed. ‘You’ve gone all this time without acknowledging her; it would be an act of great wickedness to continue doing so now.’

‘What about Gina? What do I say to her?’

‘The truth. Which she’ll have to learn to live with. Rosco and Scarlet, too. But I tell you this: I for one won’t pretend she doesn’t exist. She’s my granddaughter, and for the little time I still have left on earth, I want to get to know her.’

‘I didn’t pretend she didn’t exist,’ he said defensively. ‘I didn’t wilfully turn my back on her. It was Fay who wanted me to have nothing to do with the baby. She insisted on that; she wanted a clean break for the sake of her marriage.’

There was a soft knock at the door. Stirling opened it, guessing who it would be. He was right.

‘Your tea,’ she said.

He took the tray from her. He didn’t want her waiting on him. Bad enough that he’d had to treat her as a waitress down in the kitchen just now in front of those two women. ‘Come in,’ he said.

She glanced warily into the room. She didn’t look as confident as she had downstairs.

Cecily moved forward. ‘Come in,’ she repeated. ‘We won’t bite you.’

From the window seat, Pen ended her call with a strained goodbye. She said, ‘Lloyd says he’ll be on the first plane he can get a seat on.’ She looked at Stirling holding the tray of tea things, then at who had brought it. She tilted her head to one side, just as he had seen her do a million times before when she was trying to remember something. ‘Aren’t you the girl who came to my house this afternoon?’ she asked. ‘What are you doing here?’

Not knowing what Pen was referring to, Stirling put the tray down on the ottoman at the end of the bed and said, ‘Let me pour you some tea, Pen.’

From behind him, and without answering Pen, Katie said, ‘I’ll leave you to it, then.’

Stirling turned round quickly, knocking one of the cups with his hand. ‘No! Not yet.’ He righted the cup in its saucer. ‘How will I be able to contact you?’

‘Maybe you need time to decide if you really want to,’ she replied evenly.

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Cecily cut in. ‘Of course he’s going to want to get in touch with you. And if he doesn’t, I most certainly do. Do you live in the Henley area?’

‘I live in Brighton.’

‘So where are you staying tonight?’

‘I planned to drive home. That was before I got roped in to being a waitress for the evening. None of this was supposed to happen. I’m really sorry. I’m sorry now that I came. It was a mistake. But I was curious. I just wanted to see what you looked like.’ She looked over at Pen. ‘I’m really sorry about your husband.’

‘Stirling,’ Cecily said, ‘we can’t have Katie driving back to Brighton when it’s so late. She must stay here with us.’

‘And how the hell do I explain that to Gina?’

‘When I say
us
, I mean
me
. I have a perfectly serviceable spare room. She can stay there with me.’

‘But Mum, I want you to stay here tonight. I don’t want you on your own.’

‘I won’t be on my own if Katie accepts my invitation.’

‘I’m quite capable of driving home.’

‘I’m sure you are,’ Cecily said, ‘but I think tonight of all nights, I’d like the company.’

‘But you don’t know me from a bar of soap.’

‘All the more reason for us to get better acquainted.’

‘Mum, are you sure?’

‘When am I never sure of a thing, Stirling? Now please get on and pour that tea before it’s stone cold and is neither use nor ornament.’

‘I know I’m not myself right now,’ Pen said, her voice fluttery with tired confusion, ‘but would someone explain to me what’s going on?’

Nothing else for it, Stirling thought: time to take the bull by the horns. He knew if he didn’t, his mother would do so anyway. At least he could trust Pen to keep a secret. ‘Pen,’ he said, ‘this is Katie Lavender. She and I have just met for the first time this evening. She’s my daughter from an affair I had thirty years ago. But you mustn’t breathe a word of this to anyone, not yet at any rate.’

‘Oh my,’ Pen said.

‘Oh my, indeed,’ he echoed.

A habitual early riser, Cecily woke a little after six o’clock the following morning.

Through her bedroom wall she could hear the faint sound of her neighbour’s television. Every morning Marjorie, also an early riser, started her day watching one of those energetically upbeat breakfast news programmes. Cecily preferred the radio; she liked her news to be succinct and to the point, clearly enunciated and intoned with just the right amount of gravitas. She found it patronizing when it was wrapped in a sugary coating of shallow lifestyle twaddle. Who needed a fashion tip first thing in the morning?

The South Lodge community tom-toms would probably be thrumming with activity this morning as to why the party had been wound up the way it had last night, and doubtless Marjorie would knock on Cecily’s door later. It was comforting and reassuring when people were concerned, but too much concern was never a good thing. When the time was right, explanations would be made, but for now Cecily wanted her friends and neighbours to leave her alone.

All that mattered now was her family. It was all that had ever mattered to her. In particular her sons’ health and happiness; anything else was a bonus. Long ago she had learnt that even in the happiest lives there could be periods of great sadness and anxiety. And often concealed. Even though she had recently begun to feel that Neil was keeping something from her, something important, not once had she thought he was so tormented that he would believe ending his life was the answer to whatever was troubling him. Had she had the merest inkling of his intentions, she would have moved heaven and earth to drag him back from the brink. But the sad truth was, once a person had decided on a course of self-destruction, there was very little anyone could do to prevent that fateful step being taken.

Last night Stirling had been quick to blame himself for not seeing the signs, but he was wrong to do so. She would have to make sure she disabused him of that impulse before it took root too deeply. He was no more to blame than she was.

Right from the word go, from the day she and her husband had brought Neil home with them, Stirling had looked out for his brother. He would run and tell her the second Neil started to cry for his feed. He would watch over him if Cecily had to answer the telephone or deal with someone at the door. He would help fold the terry nappies and patiently soothe Neil if he was fractious. Neil’s eyes would follow his brother round the room, and just as soon as he was able to crawl and then subsequently walk, he would tag along wherever Stirling went. Another child might have felt threatened or misplaced by the arrival of a younger sibling, but not Stirling; he loved his brother. One bedtime, when Stirling was four and they’d just celebrated Neil’s first birthday, Stirling said, ‘We’re lucky to have Neil, aren’t we, Mummy?’ She had kissed him and said, ‘Yes, we are. But then your daddy and I are lucky to have both of you.’