Читать книгу The Darkest Hour - Barbara Erskine - Страница 23

‘I thought you weren’t coming down this weekend.’ Dolly had opened the door to Mike with a duster still in her hand. It was four o’clock on Friday afternoon.

‘Charlotte had to cancel our trip abroad. She was summoned to some sort of conference she couldn’t get out of. It’s a shame but we’re rescheduling our break.’ Mike dropped his briefcase and holdall and looked round. ‘Is Lucy Standish here? I didn’t see her car in the lane. I thought this would be a good chance to talk to her and see how she is getting on.’

Dolly frowned. ‘She couldn’t come today. There was some auction she had to go to, apparently.’

‘Ah.’ Mike couldn’t hide his disappointment. ‘So, what do you think of her so far?’

‘She seemed nice enough.’ Dolly was guarded. ‘All she did was rearrange the boxes and poke around in some of them.’

‘I don’t suppose she had time to do much.’

Dolly sucked her teeth. ‘Maybe she saw enough to realise there is not much of value here.’

Mike looked at her sharply. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Just that you mustn’t forget that she is a dealer.’

‘You don’t believe she is writing a book? You think she had an ulterior motive?’

‘I don’t know.’ Dolly gave an expressive sigh. ‘She didn’t bring anything to write on, as far as I could see.’

Mike studied her face for a moment. ‘Maybe I should ring her.’

He waited until Dolly had gone home then pulled Lucy’s card out of his wallet and reached for his mobile as he wandered out into the garden.

‘I was sorry to miss seeing you,’ he said when she answered at last. ‘My housekeeper said you had to go to an auction today.’

‘Yes. Such a nuisance. There was nothing I could do.’ Lucy sounded flustered. She was in fact juggling her phone as she tried to unlock her car door, three carefully wrapped paintings one of which was quite large, under her arm. With relief she got the door open and slid the pictures behind the seat, dropping her bag into the footwell. ‘Sorry. That’s better. I hadn’t realised I would only be able to come on Tuesdays and Fridays. That is going to slow up my research quite a bit.’

‘I don’t suppose you would have time to come over tomorrow?’ Mike was grinning to himself. So Dolly planned to keep an eye on everything personally. He had never said that Lucy couldn’t come on any other days. He grimaced. Was that naïve of him? Perhaps Dolly was right and he shouldn’t be so trusting. Before tomorrow he would do what he should have done in the first place when she first got in touch. He would do some research of his own on line and find out some more about Mrs Lucy Standish. He brought his attention back to what she was saying.

‘I’ll come early, if that’s all right.’

It was only when he had switched off the phone that he wondered how early early was.

She was there just before nine. She was still wearing jeans but this time she had on a pretty deep red blouse and her hair was loose on her shoulders. She followed him into the kitchen and sat down obediently at the table while he made coffee.

‘I must apologise for not being here on Tuesday,’ he said. ‘As I told you, I work most of the time in London. I left it to Dolly to make you welcome. I hope she wasn’t too ferocious?’ He pushed a mug towards her and sat down on the other side of the small table. His eyes, she noticed, were shrewd and steady as they focused on her face. This time he was dressed informally in jeans and a black T-shirt. The clothes suited him much better, she decided. He looked less intimidating and more approachable.

‘I don’t think she entirely trusts me,’ she said ruefully. ‘She kept popping back to check what I was up to. And fair enough. She cares a great deal about Evelyn.’

‘She felt that as a writer you should have brought writing materials. It caused some suspicion that you were not laden with notebooks and a quill pen.’ Her gallery was well respected, he had discovered. She had a degree in art history and her husband had been killed in an horrendous car crash nearly four months before.

She gave a snort of laughter. ‘That never occurred to me. True, but not quite accurate. In there,’ she indicated the tote she had dropped beside her on the floor, ‘I have a laptop. I didn’t get round to taking it out on Tuesday. I had just about sorted out how I was going to start categorising stuff when she said I had to go.’

‘She chased you out?’

‘Only because she was leaving herself.’ Lucy laughed again. ‘I suspect she thought I was after the family silver. Is that why she sent for you?’

He shook his head. He liked the way she laughed. Her face mobile, humorous, not classically beautiful like Charlotte, but elegant, her cheekbones emphasised by the way she tucked her hair back behind her ears as though she wasn’t used to wearing it loose. She didn’t look so exhausted and sad today; her eyes were brighter.

‘You were at an auction yesterday, I gather.’

She nodded. ‘Guilty as charged, but I promise I wasn’t fencing stolen goods. I was buying for my gallery.’

‘Did you find anything?’

She nodded. ‘It was hard enough to find time to hunt for stock when Larry was alive. Larry was my husband.’ Her eyes dimmed as he saw the sadness cross her face. ‘Robin doesn’t know enough to be a buyer,’ she went on. ‘Robin Cassell, he is my assistant. He’s looking after the place today so I can come here. Opening on Saturdays is another problem for us but it is often our best day so we have to manage somehow.’

‘Ah.’

‘No.’ The gurgle of laughter again. ‘Whatever Mrs Davis thinks, I am not here to beg, borrow, buy or steal any of Evelyn’s work. Far from it. The gallery was Larry’s. I am not even sure I want to keep it going.’ She stopped as though surprised by what she had said.

Mike was still watching her steadily and she was beginning to find it a bit disconcerting. She was talking too much but somehow she couldn’t stop. ‘My dream was to be a writer; a biographer and we both had this interest in Evelyn as a Sussex painter. I abandoned the idea after he died but then the grant came through and I felt I had to honour our dream.’ Her voice faded and she sat staring down into the coffee mug. ‘Maybe I can’t do both. I don’t know.’ She looked up and saw he was still watching her. ‘Sorry. Not your problem.’

‘Unless you give up on Evie,’ he said gently.

‘I won’t give up on Evie.’ She picked up the mug. ‘Or Ralph.’ The name seemed to hang in the air for a moment longer than necessary.

She sipped the coffee then glanced at him over the rim of the mug. ‘I don’t suppose either of them haunt this place?’

It was his turn to laugh. ‘Well, Ralph never came here, so I doubt if he would. But Evie?’ He wrinkled his brow. ‘She has certainly left a strong presence here, let’s put it that way.’

She looked thoughtful for a moment and he put down his mug. ‘You weren’t being serious?’

‘No, of course not,’ she said quickly, ‘but, as you say, she has left a strong presence here. One would have to be very insensitive not to feel it.’

‘She loved this place. It feels a bit like a betrayal to be moving her stuff out, if I’m honest.’

‘That’s how Mrs Davis feels. But I can understand your fiancée wanting to –’

‘She’s not my fiancée,’ he interrupted sharply.

‘Sorry. Partner, then. Whatever.’ She changed the subject hurriedly. ‘It is helpful for me to have it all out there, then I can sort through it more easily.’ She hesitated. ‘I gather from Mrs Davis that any diaries there may have been were inherited by your cousin?’

He frowned. ‘I don’t think Evie kept any diaries.’

She looked puzzled. ‘I must have misunderstood. No matter. There seem to be a great many letters from her friends. I am sure I can find material there. She was obviously a hoarder!’ She smiled.

‘Indeed.’ He stood up suddenly. ‘Shall we go to the studio and take a look?’

She followed him into the lush garden with its kaleidoscope of flowers, the grass perhaps a little too long now. It showed a trail of damp footprints behind them and she felt her feet grow wet in her sandals. Did he have a gardener, she wondered, or did he do it himself at weekends? She felt a pang of guilt. Their precious little garden behind the gallery was overgrown. It looked unloved. Neither she nor Robin had the time to look after it any more.

Mike produced a key and opened the door to the studio. He went in and looked round. ‘You seem to have tidied up. Or was that Dolly?’

‘Me!’ Lucy moved over to the table. ‘I needed space to work and make notes. There is a tremendous amount of stuff here. Even her clothes.’ She moved over to a couple of large cardboard boxes. ‘Shoes. Hats. Handbags.’

‘Ah.’ For a moment he looked uncomfortable. ‘Charlotte may have misunderstood when I said we should put her papers out here. She seems to have brought everything.’

‘It’s a small house,’ Lucy said sympathetically. ‘I’m sure you both need the space. I’ll go through it all and then perhaps you can decide what should be kept. For the archive,’ she added hastily, afraid she might have overstepped the mark.

‘Good idea.’ He glanced round helplessly. ‘There seems to be an awful lot more stuff than I expected. How on earth are you going to find time to go through everything?’

‘With great difficulty if I can only come once or twice a week.’ She glanced up at him frankly.

He shook his head. ‘I can see that. Perhaps we can find a way of circumventing Dolly’s surveillance.’

For a moment she was speechless. ‘Does she give the orders round here then?’ she said at last.

He screwed up his face quizzically. ‘Pretty much. I rely on her such a lot. You can see why. I’m away most of the time and she has been coming here for more than forty years. The house and garden wouldn’t survive without her.

‘I see.’ Lucy sighed. ‘Sorry. It’s not my business anyway. It won’t be hard obviously to sort out the paperwork from the other stuff.’ She gave a reluctant smile. ‘Then I’ll try and roughly put it into some kind of chronological order. I hope she won’t mind me using a computer?’

‘Now. Now.’ The reprimand was gentle. ‘I’m sure it will be fine. We are going to help you as much as we can.’

She felt very small suddenly. ‘Sorry. It’s frustration. I can’t wait to start.’

‘Then why not start now? I won’t get in your way. Perhaps we can adjourn to the pub at lunchtime to compare notes?’ He paused. ‘I don’t know how to tell you this but I’m afraid there is still much more in the house.’

She made a face. ‘It is her whole life, Michael. May I call you Michael? Mrs Davis, Dolly, is always so formal. But as long as there is room in the studio we can go on bringing it over here. It is all stacking away quite neatly.’ She hesitated for a moment. ‘I take it you have no reservations about all this. You haven’t changed your mind about me working here?’

He shook his head. ‘I don’t think we’ve got anything to hide. If I had the slightest inkling that there was I wouldn’t let you within a mile of it all. Please don’t let Dolly put you off. And it’s Mike. Please.’

She watched as he strode back across the lawn towards the shed in the far corner. Ah, her question about lawn mowing was about to be answered. She saw him bend to pick up a red fuel can from just inside the door. He shook it experimentally, nodded as though satisfied there was enough fuel for his enterprise and then dragged the mower out into the sunshine.

Leaving the door open to let in the sunlight she turned back to the boxes. Almost at once she struck gold. A small battered attaché case had been pushed into one of the large cardboard cartons, together with several shabby leather handbags. Lucy was about to push the whole lot to one side when she saw the locks on the case. One of them had flipped open. She pulled the case out of the box and set it on the table. The other lock was stiff but after some tugging it reluctantly sprang back as well, releasing a musty smell of old leather. Inside the lid there were several suede pockets, ragged now and full of small holes as though they had been nibbled by some insect, one full of unused envelopes, the others stuffed with sheets of paper closely covered in small scrawled writing, much crossed out and rewritten. Pulling out a handful she stared down at them. Was this Evie’s handwriting? She set the sheets down on the table and selected one, trying to decipher the words. It has come to my notice that … then a bit that was crossed out. Lucy squinted at it … you have been less than honest, then another bit more clear this time. How could you do this to me? Lucy hooked her foot around the leg of the stool behind her, pulling it closer and she sat down, her eyes glued to the sheet of paper. It was the rough draft of a letter. Carefully she read it through. There was much in the same vein – recriminations, anger, frustration – the strongest passages crossed and recrossed out, softened, reworded. She turned over the last sheet. Nothing. She sorted through all the sheets. Of this particular letter there was no beginning and no ending. To her enormous frustration there was no way of telling who it had been addressed to or the date.

The other fragments of paper she pulled out were varied and torn but some, to her great delight, were actually about Evie’s painting.

‘Yes!’ Lucy murmured. This was what she wanted. She glanced over her shoulder towards the door. Mike was moving steadily behind the mower in the distance, partially hidden behind a couple of ancient apple trees. Her first instinct had been to call him and show him what she had found but something made her pause. In spite of what he had said she still wasn’t a hundred per cent convinced that he was wholly on side about the biography. If I had the slightest inkling that there was anything to hide I wouldn’t let you within a mile. The words echoed in her head for a moment. There was a warning there; a threat even. If she uncovered more personal stuff was he likely to confiscate it or worse, burn it? She had heard of families reacting like that before. She hesitated, tempted to stuff the contentious pages into her bag. No, that would be unforgivable, stealing. But perhaps just for now she would quietly put them safely to one side and wait to see what else turned up.

It was after one o’clock when Mike stuck his head round the door. ‘Would this be a good moment to stroll up to the pub?’ He stepped into the studio and fished in his pocket for a piece of paper. ‘Put this somewhere safe before I forget. The address of the farm where Evie was brought up. I don’t have the phone number, I’m afraid, but it is owned by some people called Chappell.’

She tucked the scrap of paper into her tote then she grabbed her purse out of the bag and followed him. They made their way up the lane towards the village. A cluster of houses, most built of flint like Rosebank, some old red brick and some timber framed, clustered around a small green, next to which was the village church. The thatched, picture-book country inn, the upper storey covered in hung tiles, was a few minutes’ walk further on up the lane.

‘So, have you found anything useful?’ He introduced her to the couple who ran the pub and they had ordered at the bar before finding themselves a table on the terrace at the back.

‘I’m still sorting stuff out.’ Lucy sat down in the shade of a pergola covered with yet more roses. ‘It seems to me she kept every single bill and bank statement and receipt she ever had.’

He laughed. ‘That will make for a singularly dull biography.’

‘It will if that’s all I can find.’ She reached up to her dark glasses tucked on top of her head and slid them down onto her nose. ‘I hope you have lots of anecdotes you can tell me to fill out the gaps between her visits to the bank. Gossip, scandal, family rows. That sort of thing.’

She was watching him from behind the glasses and she saw him look away suddenly. He was quite handsome, she decided, in an unorthodox kind of way. ‘All families have secrets,’ she went on gently, ‘and sometimes there is no reason for them to be secret any more. Times passes. The people involved have died.’ She paused hopefully, taking a sip from her wine glass.

Mike sat back in his rustic chair with a sigh. Beneath him the wood creaked in sympathy. ‘I think there were family rows. The trouble is they would have been when I was too young to understand them and once I had my own life, you know how kids are, I wasn’t really interested. I loved my grandmother, but I’m afraid I was more interested in me. And so was she. She was fantastically modern in her outlook. She never talked about the past.’ He looked up sharply. ‘If I’m honest, I’d rather you stuck to the subject of her painting. You know she went to the Royal College of Art before she became a war artist? Now that is a topic people would find intriguing. She never completed the course because of the war. Instead she worked on the family farm. That is how she gained access to the airfields. Through her brother, Ralph, sketching between her stints milking cows.’