Chapter 36
Alec was waiting for her at the main entrance to the showground, together with a young man in a chauffeur’s uniform.
‘You’re late, Lisa.’
‘Sorry. We had to negotiate Mark Ditcheat’s herd. It was a disgrace – ’
‘Later, darling. I’ll walk but Jenkins will drive you to the lake. We’ll take the children on from there,’ he said brusquely. ‘Jenkins can park the car.’ Alec, busy adjusting Janus’s cast, was directing Jenkins on exactly where to let them off, then sprinted away to meet them.
There was something odd about the young man who smiled too wide as she handed him the car keys. He’d swept his cap off as Lisa climbed out of the driving seat. His hair, jet black, seemed to have been oiled. He had smooth, curiously milky skin freckling brown-green irises. An unusual colour-combination, Lisa’s trained eye registered as she leaned forward to buckle her seatbelt in the seat between the Seb and Jeffers. The chauffeur shifted his cap forward, evidently hot, and as he did so Lisa was surprised to see the hair on the back of his neck, low down where it merged into his back, was ginger. Something impelled her to look at his hair again.
Jet black - too black, she thought. It looked as though he dyed it. And the eyebrows, too? She looked into the rear view mirror. And then she saw what had been worrying her subconscious. The eyebrows were the same jet black as the hair, but the eyelashes were light ginger, like the soft down on the back of the hands gripping the steering wheel. This young man dyed his hair!
Alec arrived, helped the two boys out of their car seats but allowed Lisa to deal with Janus. The child wasn’t able to walk at all. She put him in the special pushchair they’d bought for him, and propelled him towards the bank of benches erected around the lake.
‘Jansy!’ Geraldine caught sight of the Wildmores and came towards them, smiling bright teeth. She didn’t even glance at Alec. Dark glossy ringlets overwhelmed bare shoulders, russet sequins on black lace corseted her exquisite figure into a tight hug, and her long lycra-clad legs shimmered silver dust into Italian sandals.
The child in the pushchair leaned away from her. His big wide eyes assessed her stability and noticed a flaw. Lisa saw the eyes gleam into life, then jog the pushchair into stonier ground. Catching his drift, she veered off the carefully cut turf.
‘Not there, Gerry!’
But Geraldine, already caught, began to teeter, then skip precariously as her long skinny heels sank between ruts. Alec offered an arm. Too late; there was a crack as the left heel broke off.
‘Oh, dear,’ Lisa commiserated. ‘What a shame. Such lovely shoes.’
‘That’s not going to worry her!’ Nigel Carruthers, welcoming them, roared with laughter. ‘She’s got at least another hundred pairs to choose from!’
But not here, Lisa thought gleefully as she watched Janus’s lips curl up into a rare smile.
‘Just the man I wanted to see,’ Lisa greeted Flaxton’s MD. ‘I’ve been meaning to tell you about those drivers of yours. They rush your yellow lorries across the moors as though they were torpedoes! We’re late because they stampeded a whole herd of cows into us. It’s getting disgraceful, and dangerous.’
Carruthers smiled urbanely at her. ‘I do apologise, my dear. It’s the latest Scania engines, I’m afraid. Bit tempting, I daresay,’ he smiled charmingly at her. ‘You know what young men are!’
‘But you will have a word with their foreman?’
‘Lisa!’ Nanette Fitch-Templeton sailed over and took Seb and Jeffers in each hand. ‘I’m so glad you could come. And just in time. We’ve got a special treat for all of you.’
She led the way down to the showground lake now fringed by wide terraces and backed by a rockery straight from the Chelsea Garden Show. A fountain of bubbling water gushed out over a pair of dolphins frisking enjoyment.
‘Look, Seb,’ she encouraged the little boy. ‘All your friends are here. Go and sit with them at the front. Look after Jeffers, now.’ She turned back to Lisa. ‘And we’ll make sure Jansy has the best view. You’d like that, wouldn’t you, Jansy?’
The child leaned away from her, banging the side of his chair.
Nanette turned back to Lisa. ‘How’s his leg getting on?’
‘The cast is coming off in a couple of weeks. Then we’ll have to work hard at exercising his leg, to get the muscle tone back, but once that’s there he’ll be fine.’
‘No permanent damage?’
‘The doctors say he may feel the change in the weather, but even that’s not as bad with plastic as with metal.’
‘You mean the plastic will be there permanently?’
‘I’m told the bone grows round it, and it becomes part of his makeup.’ Lisa smiled broadly. ‘No different from having a filling in a tooth, I suppose.’
Was it her imagination, or did Nanette heave a sigh of relief? ‘How wonderful,’ she breathed. ‘Now we can enjoy the show.’
The dolphins were twirling in the lake, throwing themselves in and out of the water, spraying the audience. Two lithe young men appeared, one with a plastic pail, the other with a ring and ball.
The dolphins began to go through their routine, catching the ball on their noses, diving through the ring, jumping out of the water to catch fish. Lisa wasn’t sure what Fitch-Templeton did for a living, apart from the Flaxton directorship he’d recently taken on, but it was evidently paying dividends. The party had been put on for the benefit of his fellow directors and the larger shareholders. The lake had been widened into an immense pool for the dolphin display.
As a finale one of the dolphins balanced a large wide platter on its nose. The first young man kept it steady; the second produced a cake, with eighteen lighted candles precariously balanced on that. The audience cheered and began to sing ‘Happy Birthday to you, dear Geraldine’.
Speeches followed, presentations were made.
‘And I’m delighted to announce that Alec Wildmore will be joining the Flaxton board,’ Nigel Carruthers was saying, turning to wave at the Wildmore family, ‘as from today. As you know, he’s organising our takeover of Grammidge. We’ll be gaining a gifted new financial director. He’ll see us into our new future; he’ll mastermind Flaxton going public.’
Dutiful claps, subdued ‘Jolly goods’ around the packed stand.
‘There is a price, I’m afraid. We’re going to lose some wonderful neighbours in the autumn.’
Diana Carruthers, next to Lisa, whispered her regrets. Apparently she’d miss the Wildmores.
‘The family, I’m sure you’ll be interested to hear, have decided not to live in Glasgow, but to make their home on Islay.’ He turned, smiling at Lisa. ‘They’ve got used to our country ways, and want to benefit from the beautiful countryside on the island. But we’ll always be glad to welcome them in Somerset,’ he said. ‘What about a reunion here, this time next year?’
It seemed the Wildmores were popular. Rather more popular than Lisa had supposed. Or were these people simply glad to hear that they were leaving?
‘It’s our turn to give Geraldine a present,’ Alec whispered to his three sons, carrying Jansy up to the front. ‘Now then, Jansy. You be the one to give it to her. All right?’
The child’s eyes seemed slit against the sun, the dazzle coming from the water. ‘No,’ he said.
‘But, Jansy – ’
‘Don’t want,’ he said, quite clearly. It was, Lisa realised, his first public announcement. His voice rang true and clear.
Alec ignored what he said entirely, lifted him out of the pushchair and placed him over his shoulders. The leg, wrapped in its cast, stuck out defiantly. They processed up to the front, Sebastian and Jeffrey following behind.
Alec stood on the platform and began his speech of acceptance for the new job. That finished, he turned to the personal side.
‘We all know how much Gerry’s been helping our wounded warrior,’ Alec said easily, ‘and I know he’d like to express his thanks to her for all the trouble she’s taken.’
He took the presentation box out of his pocket and handed it to Janus. The child took it, held it high, then hurled it towards the dolphins with all his might. It sailed in a splendid parabola across to the middle of the lake. Janus hadn’t lost the strength in his young arms. If anything, it had increased; he manipulated the pushchair as though it were a wheelchair.
To everyone’s astonishment one of the animals leapt at the box and caught it on its nose, and held it there. The applause was deafening. Geraldine, now barefoot, walked over to the pool and took her present.
‘It’s absolutely lovely,’ she said, taking out the glorious necklace of different coloured ambers, their shades of yellow, russet and titian mingling into a cascade of adornment. They fitted her outfit to perfection.
Alec took a second box out of his pocket and handed it to her. The girl opened it to bring out two clusters of matching amber, two earrings which blazed against the raven tresses of her hair. She looked absolutely stunning.
‘And now, just to conclude this lovely celebration, I would like to make another special announcement. This one concerns my family and myself,’ he went on, enjoying being the centre of attention. ‘Wonderful news.’ His voice dropped a tone. ‘You all know about the tragic accident on the Tor, and how we lost our darling little son, one of our triplets. It was a terrible blow to the family, and most particularly to his mother.’
The sea of faces smiled embarrassment, hats nodded, hands clapped demure sympathy.
‘My family and I will be sad to leave Somerset. In spite of what has happened, we have three splendid sons who were born here. We can’t change the past, but we can look with confidence into the future. And a new future is there for us. I’m absolutely delighted to tell you all, it’s been confirmed. We have a baby daughter on the way.’
‘You’ve seen Parslow?’ Diana whispered to Lisa, eyes wide.
‘All those tiresome tests,’ Lisa agreed, smiling away unease. Was there any way in which Parslow could have harmed her already? She didn’t think so.
A faint ripple of surprised applause stirred through the audience. Nigel Carruthers rose to his feet.
‘A toast to our very good friends,’ he boomed, raising his glass, crashing his palms together.
It was then that the applause became thunderous.