The Real Katie Lavender (14 page)

‘You keep saying that, that you should be going. Are you always in such a hurry to leave a place you’ve scarcely set foot in?’

‘No, but in the circumstances I’m sure you have better things to do than take care of a tiresome house guest.’

The old lady slowly lowered herself to sit on the edge of the bed. ‘Katie,’ she said, ‘you are not a tiresome house guest, you are my granddaughter and I’d really like us to get to know each other better. I’m not a fanciful woman, prone to irrationality, but I believe you turning up here at a time of crisis for this family was meant to be. I really feel that you’ve come into our lives for a reason.’ She patted Katie’s hand. ‘And now you think I’m a dotty old dear, don’t you?’

Katie smiled. ‘No one would ever think that of you. Least of all me.’

Cecily smiled too. But it was a fleeting smile shot through with great sorrow. ‘Drink your tea and then we’ll have some breakfast,’ she said.

By the time she had emerged from the shower and was dressed, Katie could smell bacon.

‘I love this kitchen,’ Cecily said as with a wooden spatula she indicated the chair Katie had sat in last night. ‘In my old house I had an enormous and very draughty kitchen and was forever toing and froing. This is so wonderfully compact. And so lovely and warm. As one ages, one becomes stupidly resistant to change, but I freely admit I should have moved to a smaller place years ago.’

Katie said, ‘That’s what Mum did when Dad died. She needed a fresh start.’

Cecily put their plates of bacon and scrambled eggs on the table and sat down. ‘We all do at some stage in our lives. How about you, do you need a fresh start, Katie?’

It was a good question. And one Katie thought about before answering. ‘Well,’ she said at last, ‘I’ve just been made redundant, I’ve found out the man I thought was my father wasn’t and I think the relationship with my boyfriend has run its course. We had a big argument before I came here. But the thing is, he was there for me after my mother died, he helped me a lot. I’ll always be grateful for that. Which makes me feel bad for arguing with him. Though really it was only a matter of time before we argued about something and had a bust-up. Better to argue about something important than something petty.’ She took a breath, realizing that she had admitted more to this woman than she had to Tess. With Tess, she always felt she had to defend Ian. ‘So,’ she said, ‘probably the answer is yes, yes I do need to make a fresh start.’

Cecily passed her the salt and pepper. ‘As I said earlier, you’ve been led here for a reason.’

They were tidying the kitchen when the phone rang. Cecily went to answer it. ‘Hello, Stirling,’ Katie heard her say. And then, ‘Of course she’s been no bother . . . What sort of bother were you expecting her to be? . . . Yes, I should imagine she can hear every word of this conversation, she’s standing no more than twelve feet away from me.’ Cecily glanced over at Katie. Then, adopting a more serious tone, she said, ‘How’s Pen this morning? . . . That’s good . . . And what about identifying Neil’s . . . Neil’s body? I really think we should spare her that, don’t you? . . .
No!
I don’t want you doing it alone. I shall come with you . . . Stirling, I’m not going to argue with you. Now, what time do we need to go?’

Stirling had barely slept; he’d been kept awake by the same thought buzzing like a trapped bluebottle inside his head: how could he protect his brother’s reputation?

If – when – word got out, not just about his death, but about the missing client money, the memory of Neil would forever be tarnished. He didn’t want that for his brother and he didn’t want it for Pen and Lloyd or Cecily. He wanted Neil to be remembered for being the man he’d always been, funny, generous, warm-hearted and loyal. That had been the real Neil, that was how he had to be remembered.

Earlier, dead on seven o’clock, Rosco had called him, not on the landline but on his mobile so as not to disturb the rest of the house. Stirling had been downstairs in the kitchen making himself a cup of coffee when his mobile rang – his wife had still been asleep upstairs, and with no noise coming from the spare room, he’d hoped Pen was also sleeping. He had been glad of his son’s company, even on the phone. He’d needed someone to talk to.

But the conversation with Rosco hadn’t helped. It had made him feel worse. Far worse. Since sharing the news of Neil’s death late last night when the party was over with Rosco and Scarlet and Charlie, Rosco – in his own words – had had time to think about the consequences. The upshot was, Rosco’s main concern was that the reputation of Nightingale Ridgeway was in danger of being destroyed. ‘Dad, I don’t think you understand the seriousness of what Neil’s done. This could ruin us.’

Stirling had told him not to exaggerate, that they’d find a way to sort things out.

‘Are you kidding?’ Rosco had fired back. ‘He defrauded clients and committed suicide! How can you sort that out? This can only ever escalate. What the hell had that bloody man been thinking? Shit! If he wasn’t already dead, I’d kill him myself!’

That was when Stirling had lost it. ‘That
bloody man
, as you call him, was your uncle! He was my brother and I never want to hear you talk about him that way again. You’ll show some respect. Do I make myself clear?’

‘OK, OK, I’m sorry,’ Rosco had capitulated, ‘but I just hope you’re not underestimating the situation. We have to keep this mess under our control. If we don’t, we’ll have clients leaving us in their droves. On top of everything else, it’s a disaster!’

For the first time ever, Stirling felt proprietorial. Who was Rosco to dictate how things should be done at Nightingale Ridgeway? He and Neil had created the company; it was theirs. Whatever Rosco believed, the company was not his. Not yet at any rate.

Rosco’s parting words were, ‘I’ll check in with you later. When you’re back.’ There had been no word of encouragement from him. No word of sympathy about the grim task ahead for Stirling that day – identifying the body of his brother. Had Rosco always been so unthinking? Stirling had asked himself when he’d gone outside to the garden to drink his coffee.

He still felt annoyed by the conversation as he drove through the gates of South Lodge, passing the shuttle bus that was on its way into the centre of Henley with a full load of elderly passengers. In the past when anything had bothered him, Stirling had always turned to Neil. The realization that he would never be able to do that again sliced through him with the swiftness of a dagger blow. What did people do when they lost someone who meant so much to them? How did they ever get over it?

He thought of Katie. How had she coped with losing her parents in such quick succession? Who had she turned to? The friends she had mentioned last night who were like family to her?

He sighed. Family. Katie deserved her place in the Nightingale family now, but what would be the consequences of him instigating that? Thirty years ago he had wanted to take that risk; it had seemed a risk worth taking because he had wanted to have Fay permanently in his life. He had offered to leave Gina to be with her, but Fay had refused to listen, saying she wouldn’t be responsible for destroying his marriage along with her own. Despite everything, and as much as it pained Stirling, she had said she loved her husband and couldn’t bring herself to hurt him by leaving him. ‘Let me go,’ she’d begged. ‘Let me disappear completely from your life.’ And he had. He’d done it because he’d loved her. Just as her own husband had loved her and had been prepared to forgive her the affair. She’d had no choice but to tell Desmond about their relationship and the baby she was carrying, she’d explained to Stirling; she couldn’t stay married without being completely honest with him. Stirling had always admired her for that. She had been capable of more honesty than him.

But now he was going to have to be honest. And who knew what the price would be? The manner in which he delivered the news to his family would be key. It was vital that he kept the damage limitation to a minimum. Damage limitation – two words he never thought would mean so much to him.

Not long after Fay ended their affair, she and her husband moved away, just as she’d said they would. Stirling had had no idea where they went, but in the twelve months that followed, he couldn’t stop thinking about the child he would never know. Somewhere in the world, there was a part of him that was living and breathing. It nearly drove him mad. But then Gina told him she was pregnant again, and he knew he had to forget Fay and their child and concentrate on his own family. He threw himself into that and the business. Gradually he surfaced from the madness and accepted that this was the life he was meant to have. When Scarlet was born, he promised himself he would never do anything again that would jeopardize his family. It was a surprisingly easy promise to keep, because every time he looked at his beautiful baby daughter, he felt a powerful surge of tender love for her. There were times when he held her and was moved to tears, knowing that had he left Gina, Scarlet would never have been born and he would have been denied such a joyful gift. There were other times when he didn’t think he deserved such happiness.

Occasionally he would wonder what he would do if, in years to come, the child he had created with Fay turned up on his doorstep. How would he react? He alternated between fear of discovery and losing the happy equilibrium of his life, and wanting it to happen so that his curiosity would be satisfied. When eighteen years had passed; he wondered then if he would get a knock on the door or a telephone call. But there had been nothing, and part of him was relieved. His secret was still safe. Three years later, when their child would be twenty-one, he wondered again if this would be the time he or she would appear. But nothing.

He then reasoned that either Fay had never told their child the truth, or he or she knew but had decided not to look for him. Which wasn’t any different to Neil having no interest in meeting his birth mother, something he never did. ‘What’s the point?’ he’d once said with a shrug. ‘What would we have to say to each another?’

Now and then Stirling had entertained the idea of his unknown son or daughter discreetly getting in touch and the pair of them arranging to meet in secret and instantly getting along, both happy with the secrecy of the relationship.

Had it been cowardly and selfish of him to want to do everything on his own terms, to have his child only partially in his life, to conduct a secret father-and-child relationship so that his family wouldn’t be hurt and that no one would think badly of him for having strayed in his marriage? Cake and eat it was the shameful and only conclusion to that question.

Cecily greeted him with a hug and a reprimand. ‘You haven’t slept, have you?’

‘Not much,’ he conceded, gripping her tightly, wanting to communicate the depth of his feelings, that he appreciated she was the kind of tough and spirited woman she was, that she wouldn’t let him go through the impending ordeal alone.

She led him through to the sitting room. He saw Katie on the balcony looking out at the landscaped gardens. The morning sun was on her and she looked radiant, almost unearthly. For a moment all he wanted to do was stand and stare. Her loose hair fell almost to the small of her back, it was thick and full of waves and curls, and in the sunlight it blazed with a vibrancy that defied description. Certainly he wasn’t capable of doing it justice. But he knew from old photographs that Cecily’s hair had once been that same length and eye-catching colour. His father had often joked that it was a miracle he was alive, as the first time he’d set eyes on Cecily – as a medical student in Oxford and when he’d had a thing about the Pre-Raphaelites – he’d been so entranced by her hair he’d fallen off his bicycle on Magdalen Bridge and had been lucky to break only an arm.

On the balcony, Katie turned, and when she saw Stirling she gave him a hesitant half-smile. Something inside him stirred. His daughter. His and Fay’s daughter. He couldn’t understand now how he hadn’t known straight away who she was when he’d first seen her last night. But then he supposed he had known on a subconscious level, because he’d had the strongest feeling they’d met before.

She stepped inside and they moved slowly towards each other. How should he greet her? What was the etiquette here? An awkward and formal handshake? Or a casual and inadequate ‘hi’? He knew what he wanted to do and that was to hug her, but was that appropriate?

The moment was lost with a ring at the doorbell. ‘I expect that will be Marjorie, wanting to know how I am,’ his mother said.

Whilst Cecily was out in the hall, he said, ‘This feels awkward this morning. I don’t know how to be around you.’

‘I feel the same way,’ she said. ‘Perhaps we shouldn’t worry too much. For now you have more important things to think about. How’s your sister-in-law?’

‘She’s gone back to The Meadows.’

‘To the comfort of her garden,’ Katie said quietly.

It was a statement, not a question. It surprised him. ‘You know about Pen and her garden?’

‘It’s a long story and I was about to tell you it last night, but that was when your wife came in.’

‘Yes,’ he said, remembering Gina’s face as she took in the scene. Katie had, to his gratitude, quickly resumed her role as a waitress and said that if there wasn’t anything else, she’d leave them to their tea. ‘So tell me now,’ he said.

‘Well, I knew from the internet about a Mrs Penelope Nightingale who had a garden that she opened to the public, so I went there yesterday pretending I had a delivery for you and had inadvertently got the wrong address. I feel awful that I lied to her to find you. She seems such a lovely person.’

‘She is, and I’m sure she’ll forgive you for the small white lie you told her.’ A thought occurred to him. ‘Do you have anything planned for today?’ he asked.

‘Not really. Other than going home to Brighton.’

‘Do you have to go today? Could you bear to stay on a little longer?’

‘Your mother wants me to, but I feel I’m imposing, what with everything that’s going on.’

‘If I said I wanted you to stay, would you?’