Lynne Pemberton - Sleeping With Ghosts

‘I’m sorry about the wedding, Jack.’

His face fell. ‘I’m sorry too.’

Feeling guilty, and slightly rattled, she gave his arm a pinch. ‘Come on, cheer up, there’ll be other weekends.’

Jack did not reply but she noticed a subtle change in his body language; he stiffened and his free hand clenched tight.

Kathryn felt bad about lying to him, and even more so about not wanting to spend the weekend with him. Jack was so good to her, too good; his doting indulgence she sometimes found claustrophobic.

‘Listen, Jack, I’ve said I’m sorry. Let’s not make a big deal of this. I’m sure you’ll have a better time than me anyway. I’ve got to listen to that dreadful Emily all evening. Believe me it’s a fate worse than death.’ She decided to make amends by saying, ‘How about you come over to my place for brunch on Sunday? Scrambled eggs and salmon; you can bring the champagne?’

This suggestion seemed to cheer him up, it produced a smile at least. ‘I’d love to. I’ll need cheering up after the Foster-Ward wedding. I’ll drive back to London first thing Sunday morning.’

She stepped up to him, playfully pinching his arm. ‘That’s settled then, and now don’t you think we should go … The Buchanans’ party’s going to be over before we get there.’

The envelope from Brinkforths was the first thing Kathryn saw when she padded downstairs the following morning. It contained four letters, and a compliment slip. There was a reply to an application her mother had made about an advanced floristry course, plus an electricity bill, and a telephone bill. She scanned the list of charges, astonished by three overseas calls amounting to over three hundred and fifty pounds. Kathryn was certain British Telecom must have made a mistake: Freda had hardly ever used the phone, she’d had very few people to call. She made a mental note to call BT when she got to the office.

The last letter was addressed to ‘FREDA’ in capital letters with no surname. The big looped scrawl almost filled the entire front of the small blue envelope, and part of the address had been spelt incorrectly. Tearing it open, Kathryn felt her heart miss a beat when she saw that it was written in German. Struggling with her schoolgirl grasp of the language, she began to read.

My dearest child ,

I cannot begin to express how much your letter has meant to me. After all these years, to know you are alive has brought great joy and a sense of purpose that I believed was lost from my life. I can’t tell you how many hours I have spent looking at your photographs. It fills me with … Kathryn could not read the next few words and made a mental note to buy a German dictionary, but she surprised herself by translating the next paragraph easily … How I wish things could have been different, Freda, but we are all mere victims of fate. Mine dictated by circumstances and history, as you know only too well. I lost faith with that madman who wasted so many lives and brought our beloved country to her knees.

The memory of your face I will take with me to my death, which I know will not be long; months, weeks, who can be sure with cancer. I have … she had to skip the next word … my welcome on this earth and await my end with no fear, only a mixture of profound relief and anticipation. I will be with your mother once more. If I don’t write again, you will know why. Don’t forget what I told you, and your promise to me, Freda. It is all up to you now. I love you, have always loved you, and always will.

Kathryn shuddered, recalling the voice in her nightmares. The letter was not signed, and she couldn’t make out the postmark. Riffling through her kitchen drawers, she eventually found a tiny magnifying glass that had come out of a Christmas cracker the previous year. Using one eye, she read the postmark again: 2nd June, St Lucia, West Indies.

‘I’m absolutely adamant: Calvin is not going to Art School. Have you seen some of the students? I doubt they can string an articulate sentence together. Probably too high on dope.’

It crossed Adam’s mind that the students were there to paint and not to be articulate, but he kept quiet. When Jennifer was in a determined mood, she became totally unreasonable. Past experience had taught him that arguing back invariably made her much worse.

She uncrossed her long, willowy legs and Adam was afforded a brief glimpse of stocking top and a millimetre of black lace. They were sitting in his apartment, facing each other on opposite sofas, like military opponents. Jennifer tossed her head defiantly, a gesture he knew well. It was one of the things he had noticed the first time he had met her. Her dark auburn hair had been longer then, swinging across her shoulders like a slick of russet gloss paint. Two weeks after they had split up, she had cut it and he had to admit she suited it short. The style gave her face a boyish quality, and today, wearing very little make-up and with her creamy skin tanned from twelve days’ vacation in Hawaii, Jennifer looked much younger than thirty-eight. She reminded Adam of a wary colt; fresh, bold and very beautiful.

‘Not all art students are as you describe. In fact, I can name two kids who’ve just graduated and who look more like budding stockbrokers than aspiring Andy Warhols. And I don’t need to remind you about Luke, Matt and Kelly Bronson’s son, who got expelled from Yale last year for taking drugs.’ He spread his hands wide. ‘So it doesn’t necessarily follow …’

‘OK, OK, Adam. I’m sure there are exceptions; we can all pull examples out of the bag if we choose, but that’s not the point.’

‘Well, what is? Correct me if I’m wrong, Jennifer, but didn’t you kick up a storm at a very similar age? Your father told me that he almost went berserk when you took up modelling instead of a business course at Vassar. He still thinks to this day that you would have made a brilliant lawyer.’

‘He’s a stubborn old fool!’

‘ Stubborn , I’ll give you, Jennifer. Old , yes; if you call seventy-four “old”. But a fool ? Come on, Richard Carmichael is nobody’s fool.’

With a wave of her hand, she snarled through clenched teeth. ‘I didn’t come here to discuss my father, you always were good at changing the subject when it suits you.’ She began twisting the diamond ring she was wearing on her wedding finger.

Adam raised his eyebrows. ‘New ring?’

‘Yes, I’m engaged.’ He felt his stomach contract into a tight knot, followed by a searing pain, as if someone had just injected boiling water into his gut. The reaction made him want to throttle Jennifer, this woman whom he had loved with a passion. Sitting now on his sofa, in an apartment they had shared, she looked so poised and in control. And she was armed with the ability to wound him, so painfully, with a few simple words.

He could hear the contempt creeping into his voice, but was unable to contain it. ‘How can you be engaged to marry when you’re still married to me?’ Not waiting for her reply, he went on, ‘So Jordan Tanner has bought you a ring, big deal. I wouldn’t get carried away if I were you, Jennifer. If his past record is anything to go by, he seems to get through women like most men get through—’

‘Shut up, Adam, or try and say something original. We are engaged to be married when my divorce comes through; anyway, I came here to talk about our son’s future, not to hear you run Jordan down.’

‘Yeah, yeah, you’re right; sorry. Old wounds, you know how it is.’

Jennifer lowered her eyes, concealing the flash of guilt his words had produced. She did know how it was for him.