‘Fine,’ says Libby, still smiling. ‘You can “look out” for me. I’m meeting him at seven. We’ll need to be on the six eleven. OK?’
‘Yes,’ says Dido, her gaze resolutely on her computer screen. ‘OK. And by the way’ – she looks up suddenly – ‘I’ve read every single Agatha Christie novel ever published. Twice. So I might even be quite useful.’
19
Lucy leaves the children sleeping with a note on the bedside table for Marco that says: ‘I’ve gone to sort out passports. I’ll be back in a couple of hours. Give your sister something to eat. The dog’s with Giuseppe.’
She leaves the house at 8 a.m. and takes the long route across town to the Gare de Nice. She stops for a while and sits on a bench, letting the soft morning sun warm up her skin. At eight forty-five, she boards the train to Antibes.
Just after 9 a.m. she is in front of Michael’s house. A metal jacket of bluebottles sits on Fitz’s shit from the morning before. She smiles a tight smile. Then, very slowly, bile burning in the pit of her stomach, she rings on Michael’s doorbell.
The maid answers. She smiles when she recognises Lucy and she says, ‘Good morning to you! You are the wife of Michael! From before! The mother of Michael’s son. I did not know before that Michael, he had a son!’ She has her hand clasped to her chest and she looks genuinely joyful. ‘Such beautiful boy. Come, come in.’
The house is silent. Lucy says, ‘Is Michael available?’
‘Yes, yes. He is having a shower. You wait for him on terrace. Is OK?’
Joy leads her on to the terrace and tells her to sit, insisting on bringing coffee with amaretti on the side, even when Lucy says water will be fine. Michael does not deserve such a woman, she thinks. Michael does not deserve anything.
She puts her hand into her shoulder bag and pulls out her old passport, and the tiny wallet with the photos of Stella and Marco tucked inside. She drinks her coffee but leaves the amaretti which she cannot stomach. A colourful bee-eater sits in a tree overhead surveying the garden for snacks. She breaks up the amaretti and drops it on the floor for him. He doesn’t notice, and flies away. Lucy’s stomach rolls and reels. It’s half past nine.
Then finally he is there, immaculate in a white T-shirt and pea-green shorts, his thinning hair still wet from the shower and his feet bare.
‘Well, my goodness me,’ he says, brushing her cheek with his on both sides. ‘Twice in two days. It must be my birthday. No kids?’
‘No. I left them sleeping. We had a very late night.’
‘Next time.’ He hits her with his big golden smile, sits and crosses his legs. ‘So, to what do I owe the pleasure?’
‘Well.’ She lays her fingertips on top of her passport and his eyes fall to it. ‘I need to go home,’ she says. ‘My friend is ill. Maybe dying. I want to see her, before she … in case … you know.’ A tear falls from her left eye and lands wonderfully on top of her passport. She wipes it away. She hadn’t planned to cry, but it had happened anyway.
‘Oh, honey.’ Michael puts his hand over hers.
She smiles tightly and tries to look grateful for the gesture.
‘That’s terrible. What is it? Is it cancer?’
She nods. ‘Ovarian.’ She takes her hand from under his and brings it to her mouth to stifle a small sob. ‘I want to go next week,’ she says, ‘but my passport, it’s expired. And I don’t even have any for the children. And I’m so so sorry to ask you. And you were so generous yesterday with the money for my fiddle. And I really wouldn’t ask if I had any other options. But do you still know the people? The ones who got me this passport?’ She runs a finger under her eyes and then looks up at him, pathetically, but hopefully still alluringly.
‘Well, gosh, not really. No. But, look, I’ll try.’ He pulls the passport towards him. ‘Leave it with me.’
‘Here. I brought photos. And, God, I know this might sound nuts, but I need one for the dog. He’s overdue some vaccinations so I can’t go the traditional route And God knows how long it would take, anyway …’
‘You’re taking the dog? To see a dying friend?’
‘I don’t really have any choice.’
‘Well, I could have him?’
She tries not to look too appalled at the thought of her precious dog living here with this monster. ‘But what would you do with a dog?’
‘Er, gosh, I don’t know. Play with it? Walk it? Feed it?’
‘There’s more to it than that. You have to get up every morning and take them to the toilet. And you have to pick up their shit.’
Michael rolls his eyes and says, ‘Joy loves dogs. She’d love having him around. And so would I.’
Of course, thinks Lucy, Michael has people to pick up dog shit.
‘Well,’ she says, ‘I’d rather take him with me. The children are attached to him, and so am I …’
‘I’ll see what I can do,’ he says. ‘I think dog passports are pushing the remit just a tad. But I’ll try.’
‘God,’ she says, eyes wide with feigned gratitude. ‘Thank you so much, Michael. I can’t tell you how relieved I am. I literally just got the message about my friend last night and I couldn’t sleep all night for worrying about how I was going to get to her. Thank you.’
‘Well, I haven’t done it yet.’
‘I know,’ she says. ‘I know you haven’t. But still, I’m so grateful.’
She sees his face turn from genial to creepy. ‘Really, really grateful?’
She forces a smile. She knows where this is going; she was prepared for it. ‘Really, really, really grateful,’ she says.
‘Ah.’ He leans back into his chair and smiles. ‘I like the sound of that.’
She returns his smile and runs her hand down her hair.
His eyes reach to the shuttered windows overhead, towards the master bedroom suite, location of multiple marital rapes. Then they return to her and she stifles a shudder. ‘Maybe next time,’ she says.
He cocks an eyebrow and slings one arm across the back of the chair to his right. ‘Are you incentivising me?’
‘Possibly,’ she says.
‘I like your style.’
She smiles. And then she sits straight and picks up the straps of her handbag. ‘But right now,’ she says, ‘I need to get back to my sleeping children.’
They both get to their feet. ‘When do you think …’ she says hesitantly.
‘I’ll get on the case right now,’ he says. ‘Let me have your number, and I’ll call you when I’ve got news.’
‘I don’t have a phone right now,’ she says.
He grimaces. ‘But you just said you got a message last night, about your friend?’
If sleeping on the beach for a week did anything for a person, it taught them to think on their feet. ‘Oh, that was on the landline, in the hostel. Someone left it for me. On a piece of paper.’
‘Right then, how will I get hold of you? Shall I call you at the hostel?’
‘No,’ she says coolly. ‘No. Give me your number. I’ll call you from the payphone. I’ll call on Friday?’
He scribbles down his number and hands it to her. ‘Yes, call me Friday. And here …’ He puts his hand into his pocket and pulls out a folded wad of notes. He pulls off a few twenties and passes them to her. ‘Get yourself a phone. For the love of God.’
She takes the twenties and says thank you. She has nothing left to lose now. She’s just signed her soul away for a passport.
20
CHELSEA, 1989
Months and months passed. Phineas turned thirteen and grew an Adam’s apple and a small blond moustache. I grew an inch and finally got my hair long enough to flop. My sister and Clemency became more and more insanely bonded, sharing a secret language and spending hours in a den made of bedsheets and upturned chairs in the empty bedroom on the attic floor. Birdie’s band released a terrible single which got to number 48 in the charts, she left the band in a huff, nobody in the music press appeared to notice or care and she began to teach fiddle professionally in the music room.
Meanwhile, Justin turned my father’s garden into a commercial enterprise, selling his herbal remedies through classified adverts in the backs of newspapers, Sally taught us all, for four hours every day, around the kitchen table and David ran three weekly classes for his alternative therapies in a church hall in World’s End and came home with pockets full of cash.
Phin had been absolutely correct in his prediction all those months earlier.
The Thomsens were going nowhere.