For Better For Worse

Suddenly she ached almost physically for Marcus, and then guiltily she reminded herself that she had promised herself when they married that theirs would be an equal partnership and that she would never fall into the trap of using him as an emotional prop.

Tiredly she pushed her hair back off her face. Only another hour and she would have to leave to pick up the boys, and she still had this translation to finish.

‘Marcus, what is it? What’s wrong?’

Eleanor had just come downstairs from putting the boys to bed and had found Marcus standing in front of the window, staring into space.

He had been slightly withdrawn all evening, speaking curtly to Gavin when he and Tom had started arguing during supper.

‘You aren’t annoyed about last night, are you?’

‘Last night?’ He turned round to look at her, frowning.

‘The dinner party, and then Tom.’

He shook his head.

‘No, of course not. No… I had a phone call from Julia this afternoon. She’s been offered a part in a film which necessitates her spending a month or so in Hollywood during the summer holidays. She wants me to have Vanessa.’

‘Oh, no. How can we?’ Eleanor protested. ‘We haven’t got the room, Marcus!’

‘No, I know,’ he agreed. He was frowning again, Eleanor noticed.

‘Unfortunately, though, there isn’t anywhere else for her to go. And after all, she is my child.’

Eleanor winced, sensitively aware of the slight edge of defensive irritation creeping into his voice. Was he privately thinking that had it not been for Tom and Gavin there would be room for Vanessa?

‘Did you explain to Julia how difficult it would be for us to have her?’

‘I tried,’ he told her drily. ‘But Julia has the gift of hearing only what she wants to hear. And it seems that she’s already announced to Vanessa that she’ll be coming here.’

Eleanor closed her eyes in helpless dismay. She felt no personal animosity towards Marcus’s ex-wife, nor any deep jealousy of the relationship they had once shared-after all, she knew enough from what Marcus had told her about his first marriage to accept that he meant it when he said that the marriage had been a disaster from start to finish and that they had been so wildly incompatible that they should never have married in the first place. In a different moral climate they would probably have contented themselves with a brief affair, he had told Eleanor, but in those days such things were not as permissible or acceptable.

However, she was bitterly aware that when it suited her to do so Julia was inclined to feed Vanessa’s suspicion and resentment by casting her in the traditional role of wicked stepmother, and if they refused to have Vanessa now, no doubt she would be blamed for that refusal.

‘Oh, Marcus…’ she protested helplessly, and then to her horror she did something she couldn’t remember doing in years. She burst into tears.

‘Hey, come on,’ Marcus told her gently as he took her in his arms. ‘Things aren’t that bad…’

‘No,’ Eleanor contradicted him, as she looked up with a small sniff. ‘They’re worse than you think. Louise told me today that she wants to end our partnership. She and Paul are going to live in France. In a château…’

Half an hour later, having calmed down enough to have told Marcus the full story, she sipped the glass of wine he had poured her and asked him quietly, ‘Marcus, what am I going to do? I can’t afford to keep on the office and I can’t work from here. There simply isn’t room.’

‘No,’ he agreed. ‘We don’t really have much option, do we? We’re going to have to find somewhere bigger, and soon. We’d better start making a trawl of the estate agents and arrange to have this place valued.’

‘Oh, Marcus… I’m so sorry. I know how much you love this house.’

‘Not as much as I love you,’ he told her firmly, coming over to her and removing her wine glass from her hands as he took her in his arms.

‘What do you think of our chances of remaining uninterrupted?’ he murmured against her mouth as he kissed her. ‘These days whenever we make love, I feel as though I’m holding my breath, wondering if we’re going to make it. A race against the all too likely arrival of one or other of our offspring. When we do find a another house, I intend to ensure that our bedroom is fitted with an early warning system, and a lock.’

Later, lying in bed next to Marcus, Eleanor told him sadly, ‘It isn’t just the break-up of our partnership that bothers me. It’s the fact that Louise so obviously didn’t feel she could talk to me. The fact that she waited until virtually the very last minute to say anything to me. I feel such a fool for not realising… for not suspecting…’

‘She deceived you,’ Marcus told her quietly. ‘And discovering any kind of deception on the part of someone we believe we know and trust is always hurtful. It hurts us where we’re most vulnerable. In our emotions and in our pride…’

‘Pride?’ Eleanor questioned him, lifting her head to look at him.

‘Mmm… Because it shows us that we’ve made an error of judgement… that our trust has been misplaced.’

‘Yes,’ Eleanor agreed, adding, ‘At first I just wanted to blame Paul and then I realised that Louise must have wanted to end the partnership as well. If only she’d said something to me sooner…

‘What’s happening to me, Marcus? I feel as though my whole life is falling apart. First Tom and now this…’

‘Tom?’

‘I didn’t even know he’d eaten the ice-cream,’ she told him sadly. ‘You knew, but I didn’t. And I didn’t…’ She stopped abruptly, not wanting to burden Marcus with the rest of her problems. ‘What kind of mother am I? What kind of wife when I can forget to organise a babysitter for a dinner party? What kind of partner when I don’t know, can’t see what’s going on under my nose?’

‘Hey, come on… You must accept that you can’t take on the responsibility for everyone else around you. You’re only human, Nell. Just like the rest of us… and, just like the rest of us, sometimes you get things wrong. You can’t be perfect, you know. After all, perfection is often a very sterile and empty concept. It’s our imperfections that make us human… loveable… and loving…’

He kissed her slowly and asked softly, ‘Do you know how much I want to make love to you?’

‘Again?’ Eleanor asked him, smiling at him.

‘Again,’ he confirmed as he reached for her. ‘Very, very definitely again.’

Three days later, when Eleanor was searching through her briefcase for something else and she inadvertently came across the advertisement she had torn from the magazine, it seemed almost like fate.

She told herself as she dialled the number of the estate agent that she was wasting her time, that the house was almost bound to have been sold.

When she discovered that the bids were still to come in, a feeling of unfamiliar and almost childlike excitement filled her.

She stared at the photograph again. It was the kind of house—the kind of home she had longed for so often as a child; solid, permanent, it offered the kind of security she had yearned for so desperately.

It would be a perfect home for them, close enough to London for Marcus to commute, rural enough to give Tom and Gavin the benefits of growing up in a country environment. More than enough room to accommodate them all comfortably, including Vanessa.

With a bit of careful planning there was no reason why she should not be able to work from there. Of course it would mean regular visits to London to collect and deliver translations, but the benefits of moving to the country far outweighed the disadvantages. She would have more time to spend with the children for one thing. More time to share with Marcus.

This would be a shared home, a new start for all of them, somewhere they could all have a stake in, feel a part of.

Vanessa would be able to choose her own room and its décor. Tom would feel secure in the knowledge that his room was solely his.

Surely with so much space at their disposal, with so much security, they would all be able to integrate far better. Life would be easier, free of the small but potentially very destructive tensions which now seemed to infuse it.

She couldn’t wait to share her excitement with Marcus. It was the ideal solution to all their problems and she was surprised that she hadn’t thought of it before.

She smiled to herself. Perhaps Louise had after all done her a favour in announcing that she intended to terminate their partnership.

She hummed happily under her breath, her face alight with happiness, and new purpose.

CHAPTER FIVE

‘FERN?’

Anxiety prickled down Fern’s spine as she heard Nick’s voice. He walked into the kitchen, frowning when he saw that she was dressed for going out.

‘Where are you going?’ he demanded.

‘I promised I’d help Roberta sort through the stuff she’s collected for her jumble sale.’

‘What time will you be back? I’m leaving for London this afternoon. You’ll have to pack a case for me. I’ll need my dinner suit. Did you remember to take it to the cleaners?’

‘Yes,’ she told him quietly. There had been lipstick on the collar of his dress shirt; bright scarlet lipstick, the colour Venice had been wearing the night of her dinner party.

People, even the most casual of acquaintances, did kiss these days, she reminded herself as she looked away from him.

Why didn’t she just ask Nick if he was involved with Venice?

What was she so afraid of? Not the ending of their marriage, surely?

What was it, then? Having to confront the fact that all the effort she had put into holding their marriage together over these last two years had just been so much wasted time… Having to admit that she should never have married Nick in the first place… having to face up to the fact that her parents had not been omnipotent; that their way of living their lives was not necessarily right for her. Having to admit that she was married to a man who, despite the fact that he claimed to love and need her, increasingly behaved towards her in a way that suggested his feelings towards her held more contempt than love; that his need was more for a housekeeper than a wife.

Was it the realities of her marriage she was so afraid of confronting, or was it herself?

What was it she really wanted to do? Stay true to the way her parents had believed their daughter’s life should be lived, or be true to herself, accepting herself with all her fallibilities; accepting that staying within her relationship with Nick as it was now was slowly destroying her, killing her self-respect, filling her with loathing for the woman she saw she had become.

‘How long will you be away?’ she asked Nick now before she opened the back door.

‘I don’t know!’ His mouth tightened impatiently. ‘Is my grey suit pressed? I’m taking a client out to lunch.’

‘Venice?’ Fern asked him.

She could see the angry colour seeping up under his skin.

‘Yes, as a matter of fact it is.’

‘You seem to be seeing rather a lot of her lately.’

‘What the hell are you trying to say?’ Nick exploded angrily. ‘She’s a client, that’s all. A very rich client, I might add, and with business the way it is right now…

‘My grey suit, Fern,’ he added impatiently. ‘Is it pressed?’

‘Yes,’ she told him.

They couldn’t go on like this, she told herself as she left the house. They had to sit down and talk honestly with one another.

She smiled grimly to herself. Sit down and talk… The last time they had done that had been two years ago after she had found out about Nick’s affair. She had thought then that he was being honest with her, had allowed him to convince her that their marriage could still work, and for a little while she had actually thought that it might; but then he had started to revert to his earlier behaviour, only this time it had been even worse, because this time, every time he was angry with her, he would taunt her with some viciously cruel remark about Adam.

Oh, afterwards he had always apologised, explained how difficult it was for a man… any man to come to terms with the fact that his wife had been unfaithful to him, told her how generous and heroic he was being in trying to forget what she had done… reminded her of how shocked and distressed her parents would be if they ever discovered the truth… pleaded with her to forgive him, promising that it wouldn’t happen again; and because of the burden of her own guilt she had accepted what he had said, feeling in her heart that she deserved to suffer… to be punished for what she had done.

She was trembling so much she could scarcely see what she was doing, struggling with the latch on the front gate as she opened it.

One brief moment out of time, one careless action, one small error of judgement. Who would have thought that she… that Adam… ?

Fiercely she blocked off the thought, denying it life. She must not think of that now. Not allow herself to remember…

That was, after all, part of her penance, part of the punishment she had inflicted on herself for what she had done.

The morning air was clear and sharp, the wind tempered by the promise of warmth in the spring sunshine.

The wind tugged at her hair, reminding her that she had intended to tie it back. Adam had liked her hair… he had once…

She stopped walking, her body freezing into immobility as she tried to reject her thoughts, pushing them fiercely to the back of her mind, trying not to acknowledge how afraid she was of their power.

It was quite a long walk into town, and she quickened her step a little. She had promised Roberta that she would meet her at the surgery at eleven.

The road where she and Nick lived was on the outskirts of the small market town, a pleasant cul-de-sac of Victorian villas built around the time the railway had first come to the area.

Theirs was one of a pair of good-sized semis which could have been turned into a very attractive and comfortable family home had Nick been willing to spend some money on it. It had the benefit of a large garden and an extra upper storey, and its previous owners had converted the small maze of kitchen, larder and scullery at the back of the property into a large kitchen.

Nick however had pointed out to her shortly after their marriage, when she had tentatively suggested that it might be nice to add a conservatory to the house, that since he was the only one of them working she must realise that he simply could not afford that sort of luxury.

She had done her best to update the décor, and had been quite proud of the dragged and stippled paint effects with which she had transformed the old-fashioned décor of the rooms, and of the curtains and loose covers she had painstakingly made from factory remnants of fabric bought as ‘seconds’, until Nick had commented to her how amateurish her skills were.

He had done it quite kindly and gently, but she could still remember how humiliated she had felt when, flushed with success and proud of what she had done, she had suggested they give a small dinner party to show off their home.

‘Darling, it’s impossible,’ Nick had told her. ‘Don’t you see… anyone we invite could be a potential client? One look at what you’ve done to this place and they’re going to wonder if my professional skills are as amateurish as your homemaking ones.’

His criticism, although perhaps justified, had taken from her all the pleasure and sense of achievement she had felt in what she had done, and when three weeks later Nick had suddenly announced that he had booked a firm of decorators to come and repaint the whole house she had quietly kept to herself her disappointment over the effect of the no doubt practical but very plain woodchip paper with which every internal wall had been covered.

It was obviously Nick’s choice and no doubt he was right when he explained that it looked far better than what she had done.

After that it had never seemed to Fern that the house was really her home; only the kitchen was her domain, and she had tried to make it as cheerful and warm as she could, even though she could tell from Nick’s face that he did not approve of the bowls of spring bulbs; the flowers from the garden, the soft yellow paint and the pretty curtains and chair covers she had made for the room.

From the outside the house looked neat and well cared for, just like all the others in the cul-de-sac, but inside it was empty and desolate of all that made a house a proper home, Fern reflected sadly as she turned into the road into town, her footsteps automatically slowing down slightly as she studied the view in front of her.

It didn’t matter how many times she walked down here, or how familiar the view before her was; she always felt a fresh surge of pleasure at what she saw.

The town had originally been an important stopping-off point for stage-coaches and other carriage traffic, a vital link with the main arterial routes of the day, and although now modern roads and motorways had turned the town into a quiet backwater, bypassing it, the signs of its thriving, bustling past were clearly visible in its architecture.

One side of the town square was still dominated by the coaching inn which was said to date back to the fifteenth century, although its present exterior was that of a late Tudor building, herringbone-patterned brick insets between the beams replacing the original wattle and daub. Adjacent to it ran a line of similar buildings, once private homes, now mainly shops and offices. Next to them was the church crafted in local stone, its spire reaching up dizzyingly towards the sky.

There was a local legend that the original bells had been melted down at the time of the Civil War to make weapons and armour, but as far as Fern knew this had never actually been substantiated.

Like looking at the rings of a tree to discover its age, the various stages of the town’s growth could be seen in the different styles of its architecture.

The third side of the square was lined with handsome Georgian town houses, originally the property of the wealthy tradesmen who had made their homes in the town, drawn there by the business generated from the coaching traffic.

Adam’s office was in one of those buildings, beautifully renovated and lovingly restored to all its original elegance.

When it came to his work, no detail was too small to escape Adam’s careful attention. Even the paint for the walls had had to be specially mixed to an old-fashioned recipe.

It had been Lord Stanton who had unearthed in his library an estimate and recipe for paint originally supplied for the new wing of the hall which had been built at the same time as the houses and by the same builder who had been responsible for the pretty Nash-type terrace of houses in Avondale.

As she crossed the square, heading for the church, and the surgery, Fern deliberately took the longer way round so that she wouldn’t have to walk past Adam’s office. The sun glinted on the leaded windows of the coaching inn, highlighting the uneven thickness of the old-fashioned glass, and picking out the detail on the pargeting decorating the upper storey of the building next to it.

In the centre of the square stood an open-arched two-storey stone building, a relic of the days when the town had marked one of the stopping-off places for drovers taking their flocks from one part of the country to another.

On a clear day from the top of the church tower it was possible to see out over the Bristol Channel to the west and to the spire of Salisbury cathedral to the southeast.

It had been Adam’s gentle coercion of the local authorities, supported by Lord Stanton, that had been responsible for the removal of the square’s tarmac road surface and the uncovering and restoration of the original cobbles which lay beneath it.

Adam’s family had lived in the town since the late sixteenth century. Wheelwrights originally, they had prospered during the days of coach travel.

Fern had never met either Nick’s mother or Adam’s father, both of whom had been killed in a road accident a couple of years prior to her knowing the stepbrothers. However, while Adam had always spoken warmly of both Nick’s mother as well as his own parents, Nick rarely mentioned his family at all.

Fern knew that Nick’s father had deserted his wife and small son when Nick was barely three years old—Adam had told her that—but when she had once gently tried to sympathise with Nick over his father’s defection he had rounded angrily on her.

Fern also knew from comments other people had made that Adam’s father, like Adam himself, had been very highly thought of locally, and had been a very generous benefactor to local charities.

He had also been very good to Nick, treating him if anything more indulgently than he had his own son.

Fern remembered how surprised she had been when she first met Nick to discover that the expensive car he had been driving—far more expensive than the car Adam drove—had been a present to him from Adam’s father.

The money Nick had used to set himself up in business had also come from Adam’s father, via a legacy left to him in the older man’s will, but despite this Nick seemed to begrudge the fact that Adam had inherited a far larger proportion of his father’s wealth than Nick himself had done.

Fern remembered how shocked she had been the first time she had heard Nick voice this resentment, but then she had reminded herself that, bearing in mind the defection of his own father, it was perhaps understandable that Nick should react so badly, perhaps super-sensitively and totally erroneously seeing in Adam’s father’s willing of the larger part of his fortune to his natural son a rejection of Nick, his stepson.

And yet Fern had also heard Nick saying disarmingly how uncomfortable he had sometimes felt about the fact that Adam’s father had seemed to relate far better to him than he had done to Adam himself.

‘I think he felt more in tune with me than he did with Adam. Adam, worthy though he is, can be a bit lacking in humour at times.’

Fern had been surprised by this comment, since she had thought that Adam had an excellent sense of humour, rather dry and subtle perhaps, but he was an extremely perceptive and aware man, who made generous allowances for the vulnerability and frailties of others.

Was it perhaps because Nick had felt he was closer to Adam’s father than Adam was himself that he had been so resentful of the fact that Adam had been left the larger portion of his wealth?

Nick had, after all, been the sole beneficiary of his mother’s admittedly much more modest estate.

Fern carefully kept as much distance between herself and Adam’s office as she could; was it really necessary for her heart to start thumping so furiously fast just at the mere thought that she might see him? Miserably she deliberately looked in the opposite direction, refusing to give in to the temptation to turn her head and see if that faint shadow she could see at one of the windows really was Adam.

Adam… She shivered convulsively, acknowledging how stupidly weak she was. Just mentally saying his name had such a powerful effect on her senses that she was half afraid she had said it out loud.

It was a relief to walk into the surgery and escape.

‘Ah, good, there you are,’ Roberta announced as she saw her. ‘The stuff’s already across at the church hall. I was just beginning to wonder if you weren’t going to make it.’

‘I left a little bit later than I planned,’ Fern apologised as they crossed the narrow cobbled street separating the surgery from the church hall.

‘Just look at all this stuff,’ Roberta groaned after they had let themselves in and were standing surveying the bagged bundles heaped in the middle of the room. ‘Heavens, these don’t even look as though they’ve been worn,’ she commented as she tackled the nearest of the bags, holding up a couple of dresses for Fern’s inspection. ‘These came from Amanda Bryant and they probably cost more than I spend on my wardrobe in a whole year… much more,’ she added ruefully as Fern leaned forward to inspect the labels. ‘I think I remember Amanda wearing this one for last year’s vicarage garden party.’