Voices in Summer (27 page)

Gabriel grinned. 'Don't worry. I've already decided I couldn't go through with it. I decided this morning, when I was talking to Drusilla, before you were all awake. When I saw that great fat baby of hers, I was suddenly, absolutely, sure that I wanted this one.'

'Does the father know about it?'

'No, I didn't say anything.'

'Oh, darling . . The tears started again. 'So silly to cry, but I can't help it. Perhaps I shouldn't be, but I'm happy for you.'

'You don't think Alec's going to flip when we tell him?'

'You know him better than that.'

'What I'd really like to do,' said Gabriel, 'is to come back to London with you both . . . maybe stay till the baby's born.'

'Stay as long as you want.'

'We'll be a bit of a tight fit in that little house.'

'We'll get Alec to buy us a bigger one, with a garden.'

They laughed together, two women conspiring gently against the man they both loved. 'It's what I've always wanted. Not a bigger house, but a baby. But I'm thirty-seven now, and every now and then my insides go mad, and so far I haven't been very lucky. That's why I had to have this operation. That's why I'm here and why I didn't go to Glenshandra or New York with him. But if I can't have a child, then you having one . . . ‘

'Will be the next best thing?'

'No. Never that. Never next best.'

A movement from the house disturbed them. Looking up, they saw Gerald emerge onto the terrace through the French windows from the drawing room. They watched while he collected the folded garden furniture, set it up in the sunshine around the white iron table. When this was done, he picked up some small piece of rubbish – a matchstick perhaps – and stooped to pull a stray weed or two from between the stone flags. Then, apparently satisfied that all was shipshape, he disappeared indoors.

'What a marvellous guy,' Gabriel observed.

'Yes, marvellous. He was always Alec's hero. Poor man. A bachelor for sixty years, and here he is with a houseful of women. So many of us. Women on their own. Women without men. Old May, up in her room, darning socks and with her life behind her. Drusilla, with nobody but her baby. Silvia Marten, Eve's friend, coming and going, hungry for company. She's probably the loneliest of all. And you. And me.'

'You, lonely? But Laura, you have Alec'

'Yes, I have Alec. And it's been very nearly perfect.'

'What's missing?'

'Nothing's missing. Just another lifetime that I had no part of.'

'You mean my mother. And Deepbrook. And me.'

'You most of all. Alec would never talk to me about you. It was like a barrier between us and I never had the confidence nor the resolution to break it down.'

'Were you jealous of me?'

'No, I don't mean that.' She lay, trying to work it out, to find the right, tremendously important, words. ‘I think I was lonely for the same reason as Alec. You weren't a barrier, Gabriel, but a void. You should have been there, with us, but you weren't.'

Gabriel smiled. 'Well, I'm sure here now.'

'How about Erica? Will she be worrying about you?'

'No. She thinks I'm still cruising round the Virgin Islands with a jolly party of socially acceptable New Yorkers. When my father gets back and the future's a little clearer, I'll write to her, tell her what's happening.'

'She'll miss you.'

‘I don't think so.'

'Is she ever lonely? Is she one of the lonely ones?'

'Never. You see, she has her horses.'

They stayed there for a little longer, and then Laura looked at her watch, stirred herself, and sat up.

'Where are you going?' Gabriel asked.

‘I’ve been neglecting Eve. I must go and help her. We're such a houseful and she does all the cooking herself.'

'Shall I come too? I'm a dab hand at peeling potatoes.'

'No, you stay. You're allowed to be lazy on your first morning. I'll give you a shout when it's time for lunch.'

She went across the grass, the breeze blowing her pink cotton skirt, her long dark hair. She climbed the steps onto the terrace and disappeared into the house. Gabriel watched her go, and then rolled over onto her back, the cushion beneath her head.

The baby was there. Would be born. She laid a hand on her abdomen, cherishing the future. A tiny seed, already growing. An entity. Last night on the train, she had scarcely slept, and because of this or, perhaps, delayed jet lag, she was all at once overcome with drowsiness. With her face to the sun, she closed her eyes.

Later, she stirred. Consciousness came gently, tranquilly. There was another sensation, one at first unrecognized, and then remembered from long ago, from childhood. Security, like a warm blanket. A presence.

She opened her eyes. Ivan, cross-legged, sat beside her on the rug, watching her, and his being there seemed so natural that she felt none of the normal embarrassment of a person found asleep, vulnerable and defenceless.

After a bit, he said, 'Hello.'

Gabriel said the first thing that came into her head, which was, 'You weren't having an affair with Laura.'

He shook his head. 'No.'

She frowned, trying to think what had made her say this, when they had not before even spoken of the letter. As though he knew what was going on in her head, he said, 'Gerald showed me the letter. He came up to Carnellow to show it to me. I'm so sorry about everything. Sorry it was written, but mostly sorry that it was you who had to read it.'

'I only opened it because I wanted to find Laura. And I think it's a mercy that I did. It could have been so dangerous, Ivan. If Alec had read it before he went to New York, it could really have been very dangerous.'

'It can't have made meeting Laura for the first time very easy.'

'No. But in the last few days I seem to have done a lot of things that weren't easy.'

'I just hate that you had that uncertainty about us. Even if it was only for a single day.'

'It wasn't your fault.'

'There's already been one like it. Gerald told you.'

'Yes, he told me. But, like he said, it was a pack of lies. It's no longer my responsibility.' She stretched, yawned, and sat up. The garden was dazzled in sunshine, scented with wallflowers. The sun had moved, and beneath the mulberry tree the grass lay dappled in light and shadow. 'How long have I been asleep?'

'I don't know. It's half past twelve. I was sent out to tell you it will soon be lunchtime.'

He was wearing a pale blue shirt, open-necked, the sleeves rolled up and away from his wrists. Beneath this, against the brown skin of his chest, she saw the glint of a silver chain. His hands, which she had already decided were beautiful, hung loosely between his knees. She saw his wristwatch, the heavy gold signet ring.

'Do you feel like something to eat?' he asked.

She dragged her eyes away from his hands and looked up into his face. 'Do you always come home for lunch?'

'No. But today I'm taking a make and mend.'

'Sorry?'

'Six months in a yacht and you don't speak the language! Naval slang for a half-day.'

‘I see. And what are you going to do with it?'

'Nothing, I think. How about you?'

'Sounds a good idea.'

He smiled and got to his feet, and put out a hand to help Gabriel up. 'In that case,' he said, 'let's do nothing together.'

They were all sitting around the kitchen table, having a drink before lunch, and waiting for May. When she appeared cautiously descending the back stairs, it was immediately obvious, from the sour displeasure on her wrinkled features, that something was very amiss. 'May, what is it?' Eve asked.

May folded her hands over her stomach, set her mouth, and told them. The door of Laura's bedroom had been left open. Lucy had got out of her basket, found her way along the passage to May's room, and had there been extremely sick in the middle of May's good rug.

At five o'clock that evening, Laura, carrying a punnet of tomatoes, walked down to the village by herself. She and Eve had picked the tomatoes together. They came from the Tremenheere greenhouse, and with the warm weather, dozens of them had ripened at the same moment. They had spent the afternoon concocting soups and purees, and yet there were pounds left over. Drusilla gladly accepted a bowlful, and a basket was set aside for the vicar's wife, but still there were more.

'Why do the beastly things all have to come at once?' Eve wanted to know, flushed in the face from ail this culinary effort. 'I can't bear to waste them.' Then she was visited by a brainwave. 'I know, we'll give them to Silvia.'

'Doesn't she have her own?'

'No, she grows just about everything else, but not tomatoes. I'll give her a ring and see if she'd like some.' She went off to the telephone and returned triumphant. 'She's simply delighted. She says she's been buying them in the post office, and they're overcharging. We'll take them down later.'

'I'll take them down if you like.'

'Oh, would you? You've never seen her garden, anyway, and it's a dream, and she's always glad of someone to chat to. And perhaps she'd like to come to Gwenvoe with us tomorrow.' Over lunch, she had finally persuaded her reluctant husband into agreeing, not only that a Saturday picnic would be a good idea, but that he would take part and accompany them all. 'If she would, tell her we'll bring the food, and one of us will pick her up. We'll have to take two cars anyway.'

As she came around the corner of the house, Laura had glanced into the garden. At the far end of the lawn Ivan and Gabriel sat cross-legged, talking. They had been there all afternoon, apparently engrossed, like a pair of old acquaintances catching up on the news of a lifetime. Laura was glad that he had not taken her off for the day on one of his energetic and exhausting expeditions. She felt protective as a mother about Gabriel.

She had not been to Silvia's house, but it was not difficult to find. The gate stood open, with the name on it, Roskenwyn. Laura went up the short gravelled drive and in through the open front door.

'Silvia.'

There was no reply, but the sitting room door stood open, and on the other side of this, a glass door led out into the garden. Here, she found Silvia, on her knees, working at her border with a small weeding fork. 'Silvia.'

'Hello.' She sat back on her heels, the fork held loosely in her hand. She was in old jeans and a checked shirt, her face as usual almost concealed by her huge dark glasses.

'I've brought you the tomatoes.'

'Oh, you are an angel.' She dropped the fork and stripped off her earth-stained gloves. 'Don't stop if you don't want to.'

'But I do want to. I've been at it all afternoon.' She got to her feet. 'Let's have a drink.'

'It's only five.'

'It doesn't need to be alcohol. I'll make a cup of tea if you like. Or we could have some lemonade.'

'Lemonade would be delicious!'

'Right.' She took the basket from Laura's hand. 'I'll bring it out. You can move around my garden and say ooh and aah, and when I come back you can tell me how good it's looking.'

‘I don't know much about gardens.'

'Even better. I like uncritical admiration.'

She disappeared into the house and Laura, obediently, walked around the beautifully staked and tended borders, which were a mass of flowers in every shade of pink and blue and mauve. No red, no orange, no yellow. Delphiniums stood high as a tall man, and smoky lupins smelled of every summer Laura could remember. Silvia's roses were almost indecently flamboyant, thickly planted, and with heads as large as saucers.

Sitting on Silvia's little patio, with the tray of lemonade between them, 'How on earth do you grow roses like that?' she asked.

‘I feed them. Horse manure. I get it from the farmer up the road.'

'But don't you have to spray them and all that sort of thing?'

'Oh, yes. Like mad. Otherwise they get bitten to death by greenflies.'

‘I don't know much about gardening. In London we've only got a sort of yard with a few tubs.'

'Don't tell me Gerald hasn't got you weeding yet? He's a great one for organizing what he calls work parties.'

'No. Nobody's got me doing anything. Except pick a bit of fruit. I've been treated like the most expensive sort of guest.'

'Well, it's certainly worked.' Silvia turned her blank, black stare onto Laura's face. 'You look marvellous. Better each day. Today you look particularly well. You've lost that rather . . . anxious expression.'

'Perhaps I'm not anxious anymore.'

Silvia had finished her lemonade. Now she reached for the jug and refilled her glass. 'Any particular reason?'

'Yes, a very particular one. Gabriel's with us. Alec's daughter. She arrived this morning, off the night train.'

Silvia put the jug back on the tray. 'Gabriel. But she's in Virginia, isn't she?'

'She was, but she's come home. Nobody was expecting her. It was just the most wonderful surprise.'

‘I thought she never visited her father.'

'She didn't. And this isn't a visit. She's staying. She's going to live with us. She's not going back.'

It occurred to Laura then that happiness was a strange thing, at times as uncontrollable as grief. All day, she had felt as though she were walking on air, and now was suddenly visited by the compulsion to share this happiness, to confide. And why not Silvia, who had known Alec since they were children, and had seen him at Tremenheere in his loneliness. 'We'll be a family. And I've only just discovered that that was what I always wanted. That's what has been missing.'

'Missing in your marriage?'

'Yes,' Laura admitted. 'Marrying a man who was married before, for quite a long time, to another woman . . . it's not always very easy. There are great chunks of his life that are shut away from you, like a locked room where you're not allowed inside. But now Gabriel's back, it's going to be different. It's as though she were the key that unlocks the door.' She smiled at her own inadequacy. 'I'm afraid I'm not very good at explaining. It's just that, now, I know everything's going to be marvellous.'

'Well, I hope you're right,' said Silvia. 'But I wouldn't allow yourself to be too euphoric. You've only known the girl for a day. After a month of living with her, you'll probably be glad to see the back of her. She'll go off and find herself a flat of her own. They all do, these young things.'