Alex saw it differently. He wanted to fix it. He loved his son: Laura knew he did. He wanted to protect him, and he was angry on his behalf at the accusation that had been levelled at him. But there was more to it than that: he wanted to win. It frustrated him that he couldn’t exert any influence. Make it go away.
He’d gone straight to his solicitor. He’d made Laura tell him everything but he hadn’t taken her with him. He’d been frustrated by that visit – his lawyer had basically told him there was nothing Alex could do but wait: it could make it worse for Ethan if he reached out to Saskia’s parents. That the police might prefer not to press charges but that if her parents insisted they would have no choice, and that, yes, all the implications were real and possible if that happened.
Now all he could do, all any of them could do, was wait, with other people holding their son’s future in their hands, and there was nothing they could do about it. They all hated it, but he hated it more than anyone else.
‘How is he doing?’ He’d remembered that it was all about Ethan.
She softened then, a little. ‘He’s still quiet. He’s chatting a bit, with Heather’s daughters, but he’s pretty withdrawn, you know. I sort of have to drag him out of his room.’
‘Poor kid.’
‘I’ve got him.’
‘I know.’ Long pause. ‘You’re a good mother, Laura. You always were.’
She was shocked. She hadn’t expected that. She couldn’t cope with kindness, not from him.
Immediately tearful, she didn’t quite trust herself to answer. She made a strangled sound that might have been thanks and rang off.
32
Charlie nearly escaped. Glorious as it was to be surrounded by his progeny, it was noisier than he was used to, and a peaceful walk once, or perhaps twice, a day was, he thought, the antidote. He’d gone back to his room for his hat, Daphne’s constant protestation that he must keep the midday sun off his head ringing in his ears, or he might have got out before Heather had stopped him.
‘Where are you off to?’
‘I thought I’d head to the village.’
‘I was going myself, maybe grab a coffee. Lucy said there were a couple of interesting shops, and a café or two. I could go with you. I mean, I was gonna drive …’
Why Heather would need to go in search of expensively produced coffee when she had stocked the kitchen with about three hundred capsules, Charlie didn’t know. Why he felt vaguely afraid of being alone with his daughter-in-law, he also didn’t quite understand. His peaceful stroll had been hijacked into a four-wheel-drive outing. Daphne would say he should go.
‘Sounds lovely.’ He smiled at Heather, as sincere a smile as he could muster. Scott was watching.
They parked in the middle of the village, Heather effortlessly reversing her frankly enormous beast of a car into a space that he wouldn’t have thought was big enough for it.
‘American driver,’ she offered in explanation, although he hadn’t said anything. ‘This is actually pretty small. I used to drive a Buick Enclave, which is basically a tank.’
‘And you’re so little.’ He wondered, as soon as he’d said it, whether he was allowed to say things like that in 2020. She didn’t seem to mind.
‘Power steering!’
Once she’d fed the machine and put a ticket on the dashboard, she put her arm through his, and steered him in the direction she wanted to go. ‘Lucy told me there’s a great florist, and I want to get some things for tomorrow.’
He supposed she meant his birthday. But he discovered he was happy enough to be led. Daphne might have called it a Ready Brek glow. It was one of her phrases, and it applied to this sunny, sweet-natured daughter-in-law she would never meet, with her ready laugh and her unbridled enthusiasm. She brought with her a … a lightness. He liked it. She was quite fun to be with, exclaiming over this and that. She bought a round, old-fashioned wicker basket in one of the first shops they came across, and proceeded to fill it with some cheese from a cheesemonger (‘How do you say it – monger? I never heard that before’), paper bags of fudge (‘Don’t tell my cardiologist – this is basically sugar, right?’) and an armful of bright blooms from the florist (‘You haven’t seen these, Charlie. They’re a surprise’). When she had eventually exhausted the charming but admittedly limited array of independent shops on the main drag, she plonked the pair of them into chairs at a coffee shop, where they ordered tea and a teacake for Charlie, cappuccino for Heather. ‘Nothing to eat, thanks. I’m gonna demolish that fudge later.’
When the drinks had come, and the waiter had gone, she put her elbows on the small table, and rested her face on her hands, leaning forward towards him. ‘I wanted to thank you, Charlie, for this holiday. It is incredibly generous and kind of you.’
He was touched that she would make a point of saying so, especially so early on. ‘You’re welcome. I was just so glad everyone could make it.’
‘To celebrate your big day? How could we not?’
‘Ah, that’s sweet.’
‘And I’m glad – really glad – to have the chance to get to know everyone better. Well, at all!’ She laughed. It was a nice sound. ‘I know Scottie kinda sprung me on you all. And I came with some baggage, I appreciate.’
‘That’s no way to talk about your beautiful girls.’ He was teasing, but her face was suddenly quite serious.
‘You know what I mean, though, right? Must have been a shocker for you all.’
‘It was a surprise. I’ll grant you that. He hadn’t said much.’
‘He hadn’t said a word. Secretive little bugger, your son, hey?’
The way she said ‘bugger’ was funny – a quintessentially English pronunciation in the middle of her New Jersey drawl. He found it endearing. ‘Well, he plays his hand quite close to his chest.’
She cocked her head, and narrowed his eyes. ‘Was he always like that?’
Charlie considered the question. ‘I suppose he was always the most …’ he searched for the right words ‘… self-contained of our kids.’
She nodded encouragingly, wanting him to say more.
‘Yes. He never seemed to need us as much as the others did.’
‘When I first got to know him, I wondered if there’d been some trauma – some deep upset in his past.’
‘I don’t think so. Not that I would necessarily know about it.’
‘Oh, I don’t think there was. That’s kind of the point of Scott. I don’t think he’d ever really put himself in the way of drama. Until he met me, of course!’ She laughed.
‘Precisely! He seems very glad he did.’
‘I hope so.’ Her smile was fond. ‘I certainly am.’
He concentrated on buttering his teacake. He wasn’t sure he was brilliant at deep-and-meaningfuls, although he really wanted to be. He had probably spoken more about relationships and feelings in his two days at the cottage than he had in the past ten years. He was certainly trying.
‘What about the other two? They weren’t like that, huh?’