“Are there any chocolate biscuits left?” he asked her with a wink.
An unsmiling Sunshine placed the biscuit tin in front of him without a word, and then turned away to watch the kettle boil. Freddy and Laura exchanged puzzled glances and then began discussing the progress of the website. They had decided that in order to create more interest, people who claimed back their lost possessions could post their stories on the website if they wanted to. Freddy had come up with an online form people had to complete, giving very specific details of where and when they lost whatever it was that they were claiming. The website simply displayed a photograph of each item, the month and year, and the general location where it was found. The specific details on Anthony’s labels were withheld in order that they could be sure that the people who came forward were the legitimate owners. Laura still had hundreds more items to photograph and post on the website, but enough had been completed to justify the site going live. It was, in any case, always going to be a “work in progress,” if they continued to gather things that other people had lost. There was going to be an item in the local newspaper that week, and Laura had already given an interview to the local radio station. There were now only days to go before the website went live.
“What if no one comes forward to claim anything?” worried Laura, chewing nervously on her fingernail. Freddy playfully slapped her hand away from her mouth.
“Of course they will!” he said. “Won’t they, Sunshine?”
Sunshine shrugged her shoulders dramatically, her bottom lip pouting like a ship’s prow. She poured the tea and plonked the cups and saucers down in front of them hard. Freddy raised his hands in surrender.
“Okay, okay. I give up. What’s up, kid?”
Sunshine put her hands on her hips and treated them both to her sternest look.
“No one ever listens to me,” she said quietly.
They were now. Her words dropped into the air and hung there, expectantly, waiting for a response. Neither Freddy nor Laura knew what to say. Each felt a prickle of guilt that Sunshine might actually have a point. With her diminutive stature and ingenuous features, it was easy to slip into the habit of treating her like a child and weighting her opinions and ideas accordingly. But Sunshine was a young woman—albeit a “dancing drome”—and perhaps it was about time that they started treating her as such.
“We’re sorry,” said Laura.
Freddy nodded, for once without a trace of a smile on his face.
“We’re sorry if you’ve tried to talk to us and we haven’t listened.”
“Yes,” said Freddy, “and if we do it again, just bash us.”
Sunshine thought about it for a moment and then clipped him round the ear, just for good measure. Then, serious again, she addressed them both.
“It’s not the ring. It’s the letter.”
“Which letter?” said Freddy.
“St. Anthony’s dead letter,” she replied. “Come on,” she said.
They followed her from the kitchen into the garden room, where she picked up the Al Bowlly record and placed it on the turntable.
“It’s the letter,” she said again, and with that she set the needle down onto the disk and the music began to play.
CHAPTER 40
Eunice
2005
“The thought of you publishing that . . .”—Eunice consulted her inner omnibus of obscenities and finding nothing suitably disparaging expostulated her final word like a poisonous blow dart—“thing!”
The hardback floozy of a book, with its trashy red-and-gold cover, languished half undressed in its brown paper wrappings alongside a bottle of champagne that Bruce had sent with it, according to the card, “as some consolation for not having the wit to publish it yourself.” Bomber shook his head in bewildered disbelief.
“I haven’t even read it. Have you?”
Portia’s latest book had topped the bestseller lists for the past three weeks, and Bruce and his swaggering peacockery knew no restraint. His self-importance was index-linked to his bank balance, which, thanks to Portia, now warranted a platinum credit card and first-name terms with the branch manager.
“Of course I’ve read it!” Eunice exclaimed. “I had to in order to slander it from an informed perspective. I’ve also read all the reviews. You do realize that your sister’s book is being hailed as ‘a searing satire on the saccharine clichés of contemporary commercial fiction’? One critic called it ‘a razor-sharp deconstruction of the sexual balance of power in modern relationships, pushing the boundaries of popular literature to exhilarating extremes and giving the finger to those luminaries of the literary establishment who habitually kowtow to the conventions of Man Booker and its staid stablemates.’”
Despite her fury, Eunice couldn’t keep a straight face, and Bomber was in stitches. He eventually composed himself sufficiently to ask:
“But what’s it about?”