Lynda La Plante - The Legacy

His face crumpled, like a child’s, a puzzled furrow on his brow. He touched his forehead with one finger, pressing hard, and then took another drift of smoke into his lungs and turned his clear, ice-blue eyes to her. ‘I’m sorry, what did you say?’

‘I love you, and I’ve been in love with you since I was fourteen years of age.’

There, it was out, she’d said it, said everything she had intended to say, and at the finish she felt drained, empty.

‘I’m very flattered, sweet girl, but tell me what did you intend me to do with this love of yours? Oh Christ, did I make a play for you yesterday? I was drunk, you know that, surely?’

Evelyne stared at him. He flicked the ash off the end of his cigarette and looked enquiringly at her. She couldn’t meet his gaze. He vaguely remembered what had happened last night, and he remembered Evelyne. But he had been drunk, he excused himself. Looking at her now he couldn’t believe he had made a pass at her, and all she had just told him meant nothing to him. He had absolutely no idea who this woman Doris was. His eyes narrowed, he leaned back and stared. After a moment he asked in a clipped, cold tone, ‘What do you want? Well, what do you want?’

Evelyne twisted her hands, swallowed hard, and said, ‘Half of your father’s house is mine, Mrs Darwin said her wages have not been paid.’

‘She’s a liar, absolute lies, pay her every month, ask Freddy.’

‘She says neither she nor Muriel has been paid. Now, maybe they have or they haven’t, I don’t know, but I need to know what you want to do with the house. It’s in an appalling condition. Are you going to sell it? If so, then do you need my signature?’

David yawned and said that he had not the slightest idea. Evelyne’s temper was rising, her fists were clenched at her sides.

‘Well, maybe the money is of no interest to you, it is to me, and I could well do with it. How much is the house worth?’

‘Is that what you’ve come here for, money? Christ, you are all the same, money, money … do what you like with the house, sell it, live in it, I don’t care … I don’t care.’

Evelyne sprang to her feet.

‘Maybe you don’t care, but I spent money on my clothes, they were ruined, I spent money on a train ticket, my handbag, all lost at the fair you took me to. I own half that house, now it may mean nothing to you, but… I want to be paid, no more than is my right.’

David’s mouth turned down like a child’s. He reached for his jacket and took out his wallet, throwing it across the room.

‘Take whatever you want … money is all your kind ever think of.’

That was it. Evelyne turned to face him, eyes blazing.

‘What do you mean by that? What do you mean by “my kind”? What is my kind? Poor, is that my kind, poor?’

She frightened him, confused him, and he sat back in the bed, pressing himself against the pillows. He was as helpless as a child, and she knew it. She opened his wallet. There were three five-pound notes and two ten-pound notes. She held each one up as she took it out, showing him exactly what she was taking.

‘Two five-pound notes, David, and one ten-pound note, I’ve taken twenty pounds.’

He turned away, staring out of the window. His voice was soft, hardly audible.

‘Please go away, you make my head ache … take anything you want, I don’t know what you are talking about, I really don’t.’

Evelyne folded the money and told David that if he needed any papers signed he could send them to her. He turned to her, his eyes wide, frightened, childlike. He held up his arms, his beautiful face pleading. She sat down on the bed, gently so as not to hurt his legs, and he wrapped his arms around her. His silky head was close to hers, she could feel his soft skin, his sweet perfume was in her nostrils. She thought he whispered, ‘Sorry’, but she couldn’t tell. She didn’t want to hold him, but her arms lifted and she hugged him. His warm mouth kissed her innocently, then his arms tightened and his kiss became sexual, forceful.

The door opened and Freddy stood there. ‘I think you had better leave … Come along … David, straighten the bed, your wife’s arrived. I’ll show her out.’

He stood there impatient, then stepped forward and picked up David’s wallet where it had fallen. He opened it, checked inside and then looked at Evelyne. She flushed, knowing he didn’t understand, and tried to explain.

‘I own part of David’s house, his Aunt Doris …’

Freddy paid no attention, he was straightening David’s bed. Then he hurried to the door, pulling her by the arm.

As they reached the landing, Evelyne heard the soft, laughing voice of Lady Primrose as she caught her son in her arms.

‘Clarence, yes, it’s Mummy … it’s Mummy … Oh, what a big boy you are, shall we go and say hello to Daddy? Yes? Come on, you show me the way.’

Freddy pushed Evelyne along the corridor towards the back staircase. Lady Primrose, beautiful as ever, appeared at the top of the stairs, Clarence pulling at her hand. She was swathed in furs and wearing a pale pink suit.

‘Hello, Freddy, I got here sooner than I expected … all right, Clarence, Mummy is coming.’

Standing behind Freddy, Evelyne knew she had been seen. Lady Primrose gave her a cold stare, her blue eyes flickered.

‘Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t know you had company. Is David alone?’

Freddy murmured that David was waiting, and that he himself would be back in a moment. Primrose called out to David as she headed for his room.

‘My darling, are you all right, I drove down as soon as I got Freddy’s call.’

She entered the room and shut the door behind her. Evelyne stood with Freddy in the dark little corridor and shook, her teeth chattering in her head.

‘It’s all right, she didn’t know you, not that she would have minded, I’m sure. I’ll see you out.’

He moved quickly ahead of her, guiding her down the stairs.

Lady Primrose fussed and patted the bedclothes down around David. She’d seen the girl leaving, thought maybe she was a housemaid, but she knew there would be more to it than that, there always was. She poured David’s usual measure of laudanum into a glass and topped it up with water. She held it out to him, and he drank it like a good boy. Clarence sat on the end of the bed, kept on asking what she had brought him from London, until he got a sharp smack. He started to howl, so Primrose had to kiss and cuddle him.

David held up his arm for her to go to him and she sat beside him and kissed his neck and his brow, petting him just like she had Clarence.

‘There, there, darling, shusssh now, you get some sleep and in the morning we’ll all go home … Oh, who was that girl I saw a moment ago?’

David shrugged and said that Mrs Darwin had done her usual trick, told him that his aunt had brought the girl to the house before the war. She was the poor little orphan girl he’d brought to the dance when they’d first met. Primrose nodded, she remembered her vaguely, a strange, tall girl with red hair, the girl who danced with Lloyd George. She recalled that dance very clearly because it was there she had met David. They were married on his next leave, and she later became pregnant on their three-day honeymoon. A year later she had David home for good, but he wasn’t the same and they said he never would be. Basically, Primrose had two children on her hands, little Clarence and her husband. Sometimes, most times, she wished she’d married Freddy, never left him for David.

‘Did you remember her, darling? Did you remember the poor little orphan girl at all?’

David’s eyes dropped and he shook his head, he hardly seemed to notice Primrose take Clarence’s hand and lead him out of the room. As the doors closed behind them, he began to drift into a drugged sleep and all he could see in front of his eyes was an old pair of boots with newspaper sticking out of them. Suddenly, in brilliant, flashing colours he saw the dining room, Doris sitting upright with a teacup in her hand, and then a clear picture of Evelyne.