Katie unwrapped hers first. She squealed in delight and leaped up.
‘Goody gum drops! A real fishing-rod! You can keep your smelly old rod, Amelia!’
But Amelia looked up from her tackle box in sudden realization, and said in dismay, ‘What about going swimming?’
‘What about it?’ said Barnaby easily. ‘I’m afraid you’ll have to leave that to the fish. You might be able to paddle, though.’
‘No, silly!’ Katie dropped her fishing-rod on the ground and rushed over to Barnaby. ‘Swimming Day, at Mrs Delaney’s house! Can we go instead of fishing?’
Barnaby tried to hide his surprise.
‘What! Don’t you want to go fishing?’
‘I want to go swimming,’ said Katie coaxingly. ‘It’s so hot!’
By way of illustration she began to fan her legs with the skirt of her dress. It was a familiar-looking pink and white striped dress; a cast-off of Amelia’s, Barnaby abruptly realized. He had a sudden memory of a small Amelia wearing it, leaving for a birthday party, excitedly clutching a present, while an even smaller Katie jealously watched from the stairs.
‘Mummy said you wouldn’t mind,’ offered Amelia. She tried to signal to Katie to shut up. She would make Daddy cross if she wasn’t careful, and then they’d never be allowed to go swimming. ‘We could go fishing next week,’ she suggested. Abruptly, she remembered. ‘And thank you for the lovely present,’ she added.
‘Yes, thank you, Daddy,’ said Katie quickly. She picked up her fishing-rod and stroked it tenderly. ‘For my lovely fishing-rod.’ She looked up. ‘But can we go swimming? Please? Please?’
‘I don’t know yet,’ said Barnaby, trying to keep his temper. ‘I’ll go and talk to Mummy.’
Louise had begun rather self-consciously to make some coffee, waiting for the moment when Barnaby would come in. She moved gracefully around the kitchen, a careless half smile on her lips, noting with pleasure the pretty citrus-tree stencils which she had carefully painted onto the pine back door the week before. Those, and the new curtains, splashed brightly with orange and yellow flowers, had really lifted the kitchen, she thought to herself. Next she intended to stencil the bannisters, and maybe even the sitting-room. Larch Tree Cottage had, in the ten years they’d lived there, always been pretty, in a predictable old-fashioned sort of way, but Louise was now determined to transform it into something different and beautiful; something which people would look at with admiration.
As she heard Barnaby’s heavy tread in the hallway, she glanced quickly around, as though to reaffirm in her mind the image which she presented. A happy, fulfilled, independent woman, at home in her own beautiful kitchen.
Nevertheless, she turned away as he got nearer, and turned on the coffee-grinder. Her hand trembled slightly as she pressed the top down, and the electrical shriek meant that she couldn’t hear his greeting.
‘Louise!’ As she released the pressure on the coffee-grinder and the noise died down, Barnaby’s voice sounded aggressively loud. Louise slowly turned. A jerk of fearful emotion rose up inside her, then almost immediately subsided.
‘Hello, Barnaby,’ she said in carefully modulated tones.
‘What’s all this nonsense about going swimming?’
As he heard his own rough voice, Barnaby knew he was playing this wrong; rushing in angrily instead of asking reasonably, but suddenly he felt very hurt. He’d planned this fishing expedition carefully; he’d been looking forward to it ever since he’d had the idea. The cheerful disregard with which his daughters had abandoned the idea wasn’t their fault – they were only kids; but Louise should have been more thoughtful. An angry resentment grew inside him as he looked at her, half turned away, feathery blond fronds of hair masking her expression. Was she trying to sabotage his only time with the girls? Was she turning them against him? A raw emotional wound, deep inside him, began to throb. His breathing quickened.
Louise’s head whipped round. She took in Barnaby’s accusing expression and flushed slightly.
‘It’s not nonsense,’ she said, allowing her voice to rise slightly. ‘They want to go to the Delaneys’ to swim.’ She paused. ‘I don’t blame them. It’s going to be a boiling hot day.’
She tipped ground coffee from the grinder into a cafetière and poured on hot water. A delicious smell filled the kitchen.
‘Mummy!’ Katie’s piercing voice came in from the hall. ‘Can we have a drink?’ There was the sound of sandals clattering against floorboards, and suddenly the girls were in the kitchen.
‘I’ll pour them some Ribena,’ said Barnaby.
‘Actually,’ said Louise, ‘we don’t have Ribena any more.’ Barnaby stopped still, hand reaching towards the cupboard. ‘Water will do,’ added Louise.
‘What’s wrong with Ribena?’ demanded Barnaby. He flashed a quick encouraging grin at Amelia.
‘What’s wrong with Ribena?’ Amelia echoed.
‘It’s bad for your teeth,’ said Louise firmly, ignoring Barnaby. ‘You know that.’
‘What’s wrong with Ribena?’ Amelia repeated, lolling against a kitchen cupboard.
‘I want Ri-bee-na,’ said Katie.
‘I can’t blame them,’ said Barnaby.
‘Or Tango,’ said Katie, encouraged. ‘Or Sprite. I love Sprite …’
‘All right!’ Louise shouted. There was a sudden silence. Louise scrabbled inside a jar on the work-surface.
‘Go on, both of you, along to Mrs Potter’s shop, and buy yourself a fizzy drink.’ Katie and Amelia stared at her uncertainly. ‘Go on,’ repeated Louise. Her voice trembled slightly. ‘Since it’s such a hot day. As a treat. Stay on the grassy path and come straight back.’
‘And then will we go swimming?’ said Katie.
‘Maybe,’ said Louise. She handed some coins to Amelia. ‘It depends what Daddy says.’
When they’d gone, there was silence. Louise slowly pushed down the plunger of the cafetière, lips tight. She stared down into its gleaming chrome surface for a minute, formulating words. Then she looked up.
‘I would appreciate it, Barnaby,’ she said deliberately, ‘if you would try not to undermine everything I do.’
‘I don’t!’ retorted Barnaby angrily. ‘I wasn’t to know you’d suddenly taken against Ribena. How the hell was I supposed to know?’ There was a pause. Louise poured the steaming coffee into mugs.
‘And anyway,’ added Barnaby, remembering, with a sudden resentful surge, the reason for his anger, ‘I’d appreciate it if you didn’t muscle in on my time with the girls.’
‘I’m not! How can you say that? They’re the ones who want to go swimming, not me!’
‘What, so you aren’t going swimming?’
‘I probably will go, as a matter of fact,’ said Louise, ‘but I wasn’t planning to take them.’
‘Planning to take someone else, were you?’ said Barnaby, with a sudden sneer. ‘I wonder who?’ Louise flushed.
‘That’s unfair, Barnaby.’
‘It’s perfectly fair!’ Barnaby’s voice was getting louder and louder. ‘If you want to go swimming with lover boy, then I don’t want to get in your way.’
Louise’s eyes swivelled, before she could stop them, towards a new shiny photograph, freshly pinned up on the notice-board behind the door. Barnaby’s gaze followed. His heart gave an unpleasant thud. The picture was of Louise, smiling, standing next to an elegant young man with smooth brown skin and glossy dark hair, on the steps of some grand-looking building that Barnaby didn’t recognize. They were both in evening dress; Louise wore a silky blue dress that Barnaby had never seen before. The man wore a double-breasted dinner jacket; his patent-leather dress shoes were impeccably polished and his hair had a confident well-groomed sheen. As he stared, unable to move his eyes away, Barnaby’s chest grew heavy with despair and loathing. He scanned the picture bitterly, as though searching for details, for clues; trying not to notice the excited happy look in Louise’s face as she stood, with a strange man, in a strange place, smiling
for a strange photographer.
Abruptly, he turned to Louise. ‘You’ve had your hair cut.’
Louise, who had been expecting something more aggressive than that, looked surprised.
‘Yes,’ she said. Her hand moved up to her neck. ‘Do you like it?’
‘It makes you look … sexy.’
Barnaby sounded so gloomy that Louise smiled, in spite of herself.
‘Isn’t that good? Don’t you like me looking sexy?’ She was moving on to dangerous ground, but Barnaby didn’t take the bait. He was staring at her with miserable blue eyes.
‘You look like someone else’s idea of sexy, not mine.’
Louise didn’t know what to say. She took a sip of coffee. Barnaby slumped in his chair as though in sudden defeat.
For a few minutes they sat still, in almost companionable silence. Louise’s thoughts gradually loosened themselves from the current situation and began to float idly around her mind like dust particles in the sunshine, bouncing quickly away whenever she inadvertently hit on anything too painful or serious. Sitting, sipping her coffee, feeling the sunshine warm on her face, she could almost forget about everything else. Meanwhile Barnaby sat, in spite of himself, blackly imagining Louise in a pair of strong dinner-jacketed arms; dancing, whirling, laughing, being happy, how could she?
Suddenly there was a rattling at the back door. Louise looked up. Katie was beaming in through the kitchen window, triumphantly clutching a shiny can. The door opened and Amelia bounded in.
‘We had a lift,’ she said breathlessly, ‘from Mrs Seddon-Wilson. She said, were we going to the swimming?’
‘And we said, yes we were, nearly,’ said Katie. She danced over to Barnaby. ‘Are we going, Daddy? Are we going swimming?’
‘We haven’t talked about it yet,’ said Louise quickly.
‘You must have!’ said Katie in astonishment. ‘You were talking all that time, when we went to the shop and got our drinks … They didn’t have any Sprite,’ she added sorrowfully, ‘but I got Fanta.’ She offered her can to Louise.
‘May you open my drink for me?’
‘In a minute,’ said Louise, distractedly.
‘Are we going swimming, Mummy?’ asked Amelia anxiously. ‘Mrs Seddon-Wilson said it was going to be tremendous fun.’
‘Tremendous fun,’ echoed Katie, ‘and I told her about my new swimming-suit and she said it sounded lovely.’
‘What about it, Barnaby?’ Louise adopted a brisk businesslike voice. ‘Can they go swimming?’ Barnaby looked up. His face was pink.
‘I think the girls and I should go fishing as planned,’ he said stoutly. He looked at Katie. ‘Come on, Katkin. Don’t you want to use your new rod?’
‘Yes, I do,’ said Katie simply. ‘I want to go fishing, but I want to go swimming, too.’
‘But you go swimming every week at school,’ said Barnaby, trying not to sound hectoring.
‘I know we do, Daddy,’ said Amelia, in an attempt to mollify, ‘but this swimming is different. It’s the Swimming Day. It only happens once a year.’
‘Well, tell you what,’ said Barnaby, giving her a wide smile. ‘I’ll speak to Hugh, and get him to invite us over to swim another day; just us. How about that?’ Amelia looked down and swung her foot.
‘It won’t be the same,’ she said in barely audible tones. Barnaby’s good humour snapped.
‘Why not?’ he suddenly bellowed. ‘Why is it so important that you go swimming today? What’s wrong with the lot of you?’ Louise’s eyes flashed.
‘There’s nothing wrong with the girls,’ she said icily, ‘just because they want to spend a nice hot day swimming with their friends.’ She put a proprietorial hand on Amelia’s shoulder. Amelia looked at the floor. Suddenly Katie gave a sob.
‘I’ll go fishing, Daddy! I’ll go fishing with you! Where’s my rod?’ She fumbled with the back door and rushed out into the garden.
‘Oh great,’ said Louise curtly. ‘Well, if you want to blackmail them into going with you, that’s fine.’
‘How dare you!’ Barnaby drew an angry breath. His cheeks had flushed dark red, and his forehead had begun to glisten. ‘It’s nothing to do with blackmail. Katie wants to come fishing. So would Amelia, if you hadn’t …’
‘If I hadn’t what?’ Louise’s grip tightened on Amelia’s shoulder. ‘If I hadn’t what, Barnaby?’
Barnaby looked at the two of them, mother and daughter, and suddenly a defeated look came into his eyes. ‘Nothing,’ he muttered.
Then the back door opened and Katie was in the kitchen again. She was holding her rod in one hand and a piece of tangled elastic in the other. ‘I nearly couldn’t find my French skipping,’ she said breathlessly.
‘Are you sure you want to go fishing?’ said Louise, ignoring Barnaby’s glance.
‘Yes, I’m quite sure,’ said Katie grandly. ‘And anyway, I’ve got my swimming-suit on under my dress, so I can go swimming with the little fishes.’ Barnaby began to say something, then stopped.
‘All right,’ said Louise. ‘Well, we’ll see you later, then.’ She looked at Barnaby. ‘Not too late.’
Barnaby looked at Amelia. He gave her a friendly smile.
‘How about you, Amelia? Want to come fishing?’ Amelia blushed. She looked up at Louise, then back at Barnaby.
‘Not really,’ she said in a small voice. ‘I want to go swimming. Do you mind, Daddy?’ Barnaby’s cheerful expression barely faltered.
‘Well,’ he said slowly, ‘of course I’d love you to come with us, but not if you’d rather go swimming instead. You should just do what you enjoy the most.’
‘I enjoy fishing the most,’ announced Katie, brandishing her rod. ‘I hate nasty old swimming.’
‘You love swimming,’ objected Louise.
‘Not any more,’ retorted Katie. She looked up at Barnaby. ‘Me and Daddy hate swimming, don’t we, Daddy?’ Louise’s lips tightened.
‘Well, Katie,’ she said, ‘you’re a big girl now, you can make your own decision. I just hope you don’t regret it.’
‘What’s regret?’ asked Katie immediately.
‘It’s to look back on something you’ve done,’ said Barnaby, ‘and wish you hadn’t done it. You won’t do that, will you, Katkin?’ But Katie wasn’t listening. She had begun to do her birdcage dance around the kitchen, using the fishing-rod instead of her birdcage. As she danced, she began to hum the tune.
‘We won’t regret going swimming,’ said Amelia bravely. ‘Will we, Mummy?’
‘No,’ said Louise, ‘I shouldn’t think we will. Katie, stop dancing, and go with Daddy.’ Katie stopped, foot still pointed out.
‘I don’t regret going fishing,’ she said.
‘You haven’t been yet,’ pointed out Amelia.
‘So what?’ said Katie, rudely.
‘Come on,’ said Barnaby, impatiently. ‘Go and get in the car, Katie.’ He grinned briefly at Amelia. ‘I’ll see you this evening,’ he said, ‘and we’ll tell each other about our day.’
When he had left the kitchen, Amelia’s chin began to wobble. She suddenly felt very unsure of herself. The kitchen seemed empty and silent now that Daddy and Katie had gone, and she wasn’t sure that she’d made the right decision. She looked up at Mummy for a comforting glance, but Mummy was staring at something on the notice-board. Amelia followed her gaze. It was a photograph of Mummy and Cassian.
‘Is Cassian coming swimming, Mummy?’ she asked, falteringly. Louise’s head whipped round.
‘No!’ she said. Then, at the sight of Amelia’s anxious face, her voice softened. ‘No,’ she repeated, ‘he’s in London.’
‘Oh.’ Amelia wasn’t quite sure why, but this piece of news made her feel a bit better about going swimming with Mummy instead of fishing with Daddy. ‘Oh,’ she said again. Louise suddenly smiled.
‘So we’ll have a lovely day, just the two of us,’ she said, ‘swimming and getting brown. Mummy and Amelia. What do you think?’
Into Amelia’s mind a
ppeared a blissful image of a blue swimming-pool glittering in the sunlight, herself floating effortlessly in the middle of it. She looked happily up at Louise.
‘I think, yes please,’ she said.
‘Well, go and get your things, then,’ said Louise brightly. ‘We want to make all we can out of the day.’
Amelia clattered out of the kitchen and thudded up the narrow cottage stairs. And Louise followed at a more leisurely pace, humming gaily to herself and wondering which sun-hat she should take with her, and trying as hard as she could to dispel from her mind the lingering image of Barnaby’s indignant, angry, wounded face.
Chapter Two
Hugh and Ursula Delaney had first opened their swimming-pool for charity more than twenty years ago, when their two sons were children and the people at Melbrook Place – the largest house in the village – were refusing to hold a village fête. Devenish House, the Delaneys’ own house, was not in quite the same league as Melbrook Place, but it was the second biggest house in the village – and it had a swimming-pool.
The first Swimming Day had been on a blisteringly hot day, at a time when the nearest public swimming-bath was thirty miles away in Braybury, full of chlorine, and housed in an unpleasantly green-tiled building. Parents and children alike, unused to the luxury of an outside heated pool, had thrown themselves into the blue water like joyous seals, tumbling and splashing with the determination of those who know they have a limited amount of time for pleasure. Pictures of the occasion in the Delaneys’ photograph album showed women and men in baggy pre-Lycra swimming-suits emblazoned with orange flowers and purple swirls, leaping from the diving-board, or floating on their backs, or sitting round the side of the pool, legs dangling in the depths, unwilling to relinquish the water for a moment. And all around them – in the water, under the water, jumping and diving and ducking and shrieking – were the children. Some, unable to swim, clutched in fearful delight to the edge of the pool, while parents coaxed them further in, others floated in pleasurable torpor, buoyed up by shiny rubber rings and arm-bands. Some had proper bathing-suits; many did not. Many had never been swimming before in their lives.