A Gathering Storm(12)

‘What do you mean?’ Lucy asked patiently. ‘I thought all the war files were supposed to be open now. Don’t we have a right to know?’

Beatrice’s eyes flew open. ‘Oh, this “right to know” business! Your generation has no idea how close this country came to disaster and how important it was to keep things secret.’

‘I do. I’ve read about it.’

‘Then you’ll know of how little importance we were as individuals. Sacrifices had to be made. Sacrifices, yes. We had to put our country before everything, some of us. Before our families and friends.’ Her eyes danced black, angry.

Lucy felt lost suddenly, questions and answers writhing around in her mind. She wondered whether Mrs Ashton wasn’t muddled in her head.

‘I’m tired now,’ Beatrice said suddenly, and indeed she did look tired: strained and exhausted. ‘There’s too much to think about. You’d better come back tomorrow.’ She started to push herself up from her chair, but Lucy stayed her.

‘Don’t worry. I’ll see myself out,’ she said. She was horrified that she’d made this old lady tired and upset, and indeed, was feeling upset herself. ‘Can I get you anything?’

‘No, thank you. Well, perhaps a glass of water.’ She waved a vague hand. ‘In the kitchen. Glasses in the cupboard over the fridge. Oh, and you’ll see my pills. Bring them, too.’

Lucy went to investigate. The kitchen was modern and its cleanness emphasized by a dreadful stink of bleach. Lucy selected a glass. On one of the work surfaces was a tray, laid for supper. A note in blobby biro said Bacon/egg pie and salad in fridge, yoghurt for afters. A cocktail of pills lay on a saucer. Beatrice’s must be a lonely life.

When she returned to the sitting room, Beatrice was lying back in her chair, her eyes closed, and this worried Lucy. She placed the water and the pills on the table to hand and was reassured when Beatrice opened her eyes and sat up.

‘Thank you, dear.’ She seemed gentle and frail suddenly. Watching Lucy collect her things she surprised her by saying, ‘Promise me you’ll come back in the morning, my dear? Promise?’

‘Of course I will, if you don’t think I’ll upset you,’ Lucy said softly. Beatrice did not reply, and Lucy thought she couldn’t have heard. She was about to speak again when she realized Beatrice was struggling with emotion.

Eventually she said, ‘I need to tell you the whole story. It’s all quite a tangle and I hope I’ll be able to tell it straight. But you’ve asked me about Rafe. Lucy, I loved Rafe Ashton. I loved him more than any man I’ve met before or since. His story is my story, too.’

Lucy was glad to stumble out into the warmth of the late-afternoon sunshine. In The Rowans, she had felt as if she’d been in another world, a world of the past. Beatrice Ashton had known her father and her grandmother, too. She’d been a friend of her grandmother and had known Tom Cardwell as a toddler, yet Lucy had never heard of her before. She took a deep breath of cool fresh air.

Outside in the lane she stopped to switch on her phone. There was only a message from work that she could deal with later. Nothing from Will. She stuffed the phone back in her bag and considered what to do next.

She glanced up towards the cliff path, where it snaked away into the distance. There was a light breeze blowing off the sea, bringing with it lovely harboury smells. The view was breathtaking up here, of the long headlands protecting the bay, and of the sea. Little waves broke the surface here and there – as a child, she’d been told they were the manes of horses. In the far distance, the bright sky met a bright sea dotted with white sheets of sail.

As she descended to the harbour via the perilous Jacob’s Ladder, she thought again about Beatrice Ashton. She’d been drawn to the woman, had sensed warmth and sincerity. There had been a . . . tenderness about her. But steel, too. The woman was terribly bitter about something. Lucy felt a connection. Perhaps she sensed the young girl that Beatrice had once been.

After Lucy had gone, Beatrice Ashton swallowed two pills and sipped some water, then lay back in her chair, waiting for her heartbeat to steady. Her eyes were closed, but she wasn’t asleep. Her mind was too active for that. She was thinking about Lucy Cardwell and everything her visit meant. She was lovely, Lucy, with that honey hair, the stubborn chin and the turned-up nose, scattered with freckles. Hers was a beauty of character and strength, not a painted-on prettiness. She looked forward to seeing her again.

Lucy was assured, like many of these modern girls, but there was something a little untried about her, too – uncertain, unbroken. Perhaps something still had to work its way out. Of course, it used to be that bad things happened in families – dreadful things – and everybody shut up and put up with it. None of this talking about it like today. And yet she rather envied them their closeness, today’s parents with their children.