The Mysterious Miss Mayhew (7 page)

A laugh from Kath. ‘Tom’s helping? So … finished by Christmas, then?’

Hattie was back round his legs. A tug on his trousers. ‘It won’t take that long, will it?’ Her most appealing look; huge green eyes, freckles as if someone had flicked them on from a paintbrush.

‘Auntie Kath was joking, Hats. If the weather stays like this, it might be up by the weekend.’

‘No might about it,’ Rob cut in, one hand reaching behind him blindly and then obviously finding what it was searching for.

Hattie was climbing up the ladder again.

‘What’s the view like up there?’ Tom shouted to her.

On her tiptoes, scanning the horizon through the branches and leaves, she shouted back, ‘I can see the Spanish fleet.’

That would be a sight, the Armada heading up the Tyne.

I was down the quayside, completely mortal, and these Spanish gadgies came right up to the bridge in a boot, like, and I swear they were lush. I come home with a bra full of doubloons
.

Rob stood up. ‘That’s that done.’ Tom saw his eyes immediately seek out Kath. ‘All right there?’ he called to her and she raised the tongs as if to say, ‘Don’t fuss’. She stood up,
probably to underline that point, and started moving the sausages around on the barbecue.

‘Can Auntie Kath climb up?’ Hattie asked and Rob’s ‘No’ was too abrupt, which he must have realised the minute it left his mouth. He put his hand on Hattie’s shoulder. ‘Sorry, love,’ he said. ‘It’ll take a lot of weight, but not that much.’

There was a ‘charming’ from Kath, but Tom knew she wouldn’t have been fooled by his brother’s attempt to hide behind humour.

He wandered over to her.

‘Good day?’ she asked him.

‘Had better, but the main thing is it’s over. You OK?’

‘What, apart from feeling like a bit of china?’ She glanced towards Rob. ‘Start our classes at the hospital tomorrow. He’s a bit nervous.’

‘You want me to try and talk him down? From, you know … Not the tree, obviously.’ He took the tongs from her and pushed a couple of sausages to the edge of the barbecue and moved the burgers to the middle.

‘No. Think he’s got to work through this himself. And why do men always do that?’ She was looking at the tongs. ‘They
have
to take over the barbecue. Is it a phallic thing? You know, the sausages? Here,’ she took the tongs from him, ‘you’ll get fat on your suit.’

‘Phallic thing? Sometimes you make less sense than my
mother. Hang on …’ He looked towards the house. ‘Where is she?’

When Kath looked evasive, he pulled her chair nearer to the barbecue. ‘Plonk yourself there. I’ll be back.’

One quick scan of the kitchen and the sitting room confirmed his suspicions and when he got upstairs, he tracked his mother down to the bathroom. She was bent over, cleaning the bath.

‘Step away from the cleaning products, lady,’ he said and regretted it as he saw her shoot up straight.

‘Oh, bugger me,’ she blurted and then rounded on him, ‘Tom, don’t do that. My heart’s come out of my mouth.’

‘That’s going to make a mess on that newly cleaned bath.’

‘What?’

‘You said … Oh, never mind.’ He put his hand on her arm. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you. But it’s the only way to catch you at it.’

She was looking as if she’d been discovered rooting through his wallet. ‘I just saw the cloth,’ she said. ‘Thought I’d give it a bit of a … freshen-up.’

‘And what about downstairs? The hoover just happened to leap into your hands?’

She moved to the sink and started wiping around the taps. ‘New teaching assistant at school. Looks about twelve. Can’t be, I suppose.’

‘No, Hattie says she’s twenty-five, and she’s only covering for Mrs … Wait a minute … you’ve changed the subject. God, you’re good.’ He took the cloth from her. ‘Don’t expect you to do this, Mum. Picking up Hattie twice a week is enough.’

‘You’re working all day.’

‘You’ve worked all your life.’

‘Aw, get away with it.’ She tried to get the cloth back, but he wasn’t letting go. She gave it up and started dabbing her hands on the towel. He half expected her to pick it up and smell it. Perhaps she already had.

‘While I think on,’ she said, ‘I put Hattie’s karate kit and her school dress in to wash.’

‘Mum …’

‘Oh now, it’s nothing.’ She straightened up the towel to her satisfaction and as they went downstairs said, ‘I don’t mean anything by having a quick tidy-up.’ She put her hand on his shoulder. ‘You keep it lovely. For a man.’

Pointless explaining to his mother how sexist that was – she’d only just got used to that nice Clare Balding being a lesbian.

*

Two walls and twelve sausages later, they waved goodbye to Rob and Kath and he wondered whether he should tell Hattie that her mother had rung that morning. He always
told her about any contact, believing it was her right to know. But the timing was crucial. Too near bedtime and he was afraid she’d lie awake in the dark.

No, not tonight, it was too late. And he couldn’t tell her in the rush and tumble of the morning and then leave her at school to think about it on her own.

Whenever that conversation was going to take place, he wasn’t looking forward to it. He knew how unsettling it was for Hattie to have Steph zoom in and out of her life and then disappear as if she’d been abducted by aliens.

Sometimes miracles did happen, though. Like on Hattie’s first day of school, a phone call from Morocco and all the right things said. Easter, when Steph had arranged to Skype her. And actually done it.

He walked around the garden, packing away the chairs while Hattie had a few more minutes in the tree house.

It was the bats swooping and darting now and, at times like this, he was glad they were the end house in the row, with nothing between them and the fields.

‘Come on now,’ he shouted to Hattie. ‘No arguing.’

While she had her bath, he sat on the stool and she made a beard out of bubbles and they chatted about Josh, her best friend in the world, and how hot water came out of taps. He felt a drawing sadness that one day the bathroom door would be closed on him. Even now, it was probably more
acceptable to say you owned a sub-machine gun than admit that the favourite part of your day was sitting chatting to your daughter while she had a good soak.

When she got out, he wrapped her in a towel as if she was something precious. Definitely not a parcel.

‘Put your pyjamas on, choose a story and I’ll go and get you some water.’

‘And Gummy.’

Yeah, the little bugger
. ‘And Gummy.’

Downstairs he filled up a cup with water, but could not find Gummy in Hattie’s reading bag. He saw it had fallen under the table and when he reached for it, cracked his head on the wood. By the time he’d stopped cursing and was aware the phone was ringing, he was also aware that Hattie had padded into his bedroom and picked it up in there.

‘Mummy!’ he heard her say and the happy glow of the evening went fizzle, phut. Two phone calls in one day? Damn, he just knew what was coming now.

He went up the stairs softly and stood outside his bedroom door, hating being an eavesdropper, but unable to stop himself.

Hattie was talking fast about the tree house and he imagined her face, alight with the fact that Steph had rung. There was an expanse of silence, he could hear his own breathing in it. Then, ‘Yes, it was lovely, Mummy. And the
bag.’ Good girl. More silence and his stomach tightened. Hattie getting more excited, ‘Yes, yes! Please. Will it be deep snow? Do they have reindeer?’

Steph hadn’t got him to agree, so had brought in the heaviest gun of all on her side.

More gabbling from Hattie before, ‘Nun-night. I love you too. Bye, Mummy. Bye.’

It felt as if his heart was being scrunched up by the longing in that ‘bye’.

The door swung back and there was Hattie, face like it was Christmas already. ‘Dad, Dad! I’m going to Italy. Mummy says I can. We’re going skiing.’

*

Lying on his side on the sofa later, he felt almost too weary to raise the bottle of lager to his lips. Bloody Steph. She’d come out of this looking fantastic and he was the villain for nipping all that joy in the bud.

He had a tear-stained five-year-old lying upstairs in her bed, clutching her gum shield. Or more likely lying with it defiantly in her mouth.

They had argued—

‘But why can’t I go?’

‘Because I want to be there and Mummy doesn’t like that.’

‘But I could go on my own. Mummy said you could put me on the plane.’

‘No. You’re too young.’

‘Mummy says I’m not too young.’

Round and round they went, Hattie getting more and more frustrated. And all the time he had his hands tied because there was no way he could say, ‘I don’t trust your mother with you. She’ll lose it at some point.’

‘I want to go skiing,’ she had cried finally and he’d watched the tears stream out, snot too, and tried to put his arms around her. She pushed him away and turned her back on him.

He’d sat in the chair by her bed and asked if she wanted a story, but her silent antagonism felt like another presence in the room, forcing him out and down the stairs after a fumbled kiss on the top of her head.

He took a sip of lager. He had already tried to ring Steph back, but only got her message service. Lying low, no doubt.

He thought of how he’d let her parents off this morning and not rung them. (My God, was that only this morning?) Well, good old Tom wasn’t feeling so kind right now.

He imagined Geoffrey blinking awake, nose and ear hair akimbo.

Striped pyjamas, concave chest. Caroline in the other bed. Another concave chest.

‘Yes!’ Geoffrey’s bark was hoarse this late.

‘Tom here. How are you doing?’ Geoffrey’s eyebrows would be having a field day. He could hear Caroline saying something and pictured the waving-down-a-car movement she employed to get her husband’s attention. ‘Just thought I’d let you know I’ve had a call from Steph.’

A growly ‘Anything wrong?’

‘I won’t bore you with the details. But I’m not having her upsetting Hattie like this. Not after I’ve been so bloody reasonable—’

‘Upsetting? What? I …’

‘So … I am asking you yet again to help me stop this long, lingering death with Hattie being used as leverage for God knows what.’ Tom took a breath. ‘That envelope I left with you. She said you haven’t passed it on to her?’

‘Yes I did. I gave it to her when she was …’

‘When she was over here?’ Tom asked. ‘That’s what you were going to say, weren’t you? When was that?’ He wished he could reach down the phone and pull Geoffrey up it by his nose hairs.

There was what sounded like a skirmish and it was Caroline on the phone. ‘What seems to be the problem?’

She appeared to be reading from a ‘How to handle a belligerent customer’ handbook.

‘Usual one, Caroline. I’d like to divorce your daughter. I’m trying to be civilised, but she’s still blocking me.’

Silence for a while. He knew where Steph had learned her communication skills.

There was an arrogant whine to Caroline’s tone when she spoke. ‘I don’t know what you expect us to do? We didn’t know Stephanie was coming over until she rang from the airport. We’ve tried never to interfere in the lives of any of our children.’

That’s because you’d have to get emotionally involved. Emotions are messy and you’re very tidy people
.

A longer pause, before she asked, ‘And how is Harriet?’

If they were down to platitudes, he might as well give up.

He finished the call feeling that he’d achieved nothing. Why should he be surprised? These were the people who had never asked, not once, why Hattie had ended up living with him. Was it because they were too frozen in the ice of good breeding to enquire? Or had they always had their suspicions about how volatile Steph was?

He looked at the lager bottle. Unfair really to criticise them for not asking. His family had, plenty of times, and he’d always side-stepped telling them everything.

He just had to cling on to the fact that Geoffrey and Caroline, in their own frigid way, loved Hattie. But Steph, jeez, he couldn’t believe she’d been to see her mother and father but not her daughter. It was nearly four months since their last, fraught meeting in York.

He got up and checked on Hattie again. Gummy was still in her hand, but she wasn’t asleep, he could tell. There was an echo of his earlier position on the sofa in the way she was lying on her side, shoulders stiff.

‘I love you, Hats,’ he said, feeling needy, and got a little squeak back, but when he sat on the bed, she shifted on to her front and pulled the covers up over her head.

Back downstairs he lay down on the floor and cried out the way he felt trapped and manipulated and how someone, with one phone call, could sweep away all that warmth between him and Hattie. It would come back again, but for now he felt miles away from her. Stupid the way the tears went straight from his eyes into his ears.

There was the sound of a text arriving and he wasn’t going to check it, but there was that niggling worry about it being something to do with Kath.

When he looked at the message, he smiled despite the gloom.

Yes please
he texted back.
Usual day?

He waited for the response before signing off with:
Grietje. You’re a bloody lifesaver
.

He lay back down and texted Natalie the babysitter. There was always the reserve team of Rob and Kath, but they asked too many questions when he returned home afterwards.

As he took himself off to bed, he thought that he might just forgive Monday because of this late present. But he sure as hell wasn’t going to forgive Steph.

CHAPTER 10

Monday 12 May (Part 3)

Yes, here I am again. And it turns out there is a number 10.

10) It would appear that flinging oneself around and grunting is not a display of aggression, but some kind of courtship ritual. Estate agent has just invited me for a drink tomorrow lunchtime to ‘discuss a possible reduction in the rent’.