“Ah, the oleaginous Julius Beecher, keeper of all Dad’s secrets,” said Tom.
“If I’m not mistaken, Tom, there’s only one,” said Antoinette, indulging him with a smile. Tom had always been prone to exaggeration.
“I don’t know why Dad chose him to look after his affairs,” Tom continued. “He makes my skin crawl. Something about his greedy little eyes.”
“Yes, but he worshipped Dad,” said David. “He’d do anything for him. If you spend your time traveling, you want to be sure that the man looking after your businesses back at home is as loyal as a dog. Beecher is that dog.”
“He’s a good lawyer,” Antoinette defended him. “Your father trusted him with everything, and he never let him down. And don’t forget, your father was not an easy man to work for. He was so impulsive. One minute it was cigars, the next rugs, then herbal tea from Argentina, and God knows what else. Your father would get a crush on something and toss it at Julius, knowing that he’d do all the hard work while George set off to climb another peak. Most lawyers would have thrown up their hands in exasperation, but not Julius. He rose to the challenge. He was more than a lawyer: he was George’s right hand.”
“And I suspect he rather admired George’s flamboyance,” Rosamunde added.
“Oh, he did,” Antoinette agreed. “He thought the world of George.”
They began to eat, acutely aware of the empty seat at the head of the table.
“Mum, I want to go and spend some time out in Murenburg,” David began carefully. Antoinette’s face darkened as she was confronted once again with the gritty reality of her husband’s death. “I want to go to where it happened. I don’t think I can find peace until I’ve done that.”
“I’ll go with you,” Tom suggested.
Antoinette lowered her eyes. “I don’t think I can ever go back,” she said quietly.
“Of course you can’t,” Rosamunde agreed. “It was never your cup of tea in the first place. George is home now. There’s absolutely no reason for you ever to return.”
“I never wanted to be in a position to say ‘I told you so,’” Antoinette added.
Tom noticed his mother’s shining eyes and reached across the table to touch her hand.
“Mum, you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do,” he said.
Skiing had been one of George’s passions that Antoinette had never understood. It was one thing to ski gently down pistes, but quite another to descend parts of the mountain where even chamois dared not tread. She hadn’t grown up with the sport as he had, and she had found it hard to accept his infatuation and the risks it demanded. But George had laughed off her fears and told her that he was much more likely to die in a car on the M3 than on the mountain.
Soon after they married he had bought a chalet in Murenburg, a small, picturesque village a couple of hours from Zurich, where he had skied all his life. He passed his enthusiasm on to his sons, who had all been accomplished skiers by the age of ten. For Antoinette, besides enjoying the process of decorating a pretty home, skiing holidays were riddled with anxiety as she remained in the valley, gazing up at the mountains and trying not to imagine the worst.
At the end of the day they’d return with pink cheeks and sparkling eyes, wet clothes and cold noses, and Antoinette would hang everything over the radiators to dry and make them hot chocolate to drink in front of the fire. She’d listen to their stories without ever really understanding their language. It was impossible for her to appreciate the breathtaking views from the mountain peaks, where they stood alone with nature; the thin, clean air burning their lungs; and the bright snow glittering like a million diamonds, for she had little experience to draw on. They’d try to explain the thrill of hopping down narrow gullies where it was almost too tight to turn, and gliding over undulating meadows of untracked snow, but Antoinette had only ever skied on piste, and even that had terrified her.
“I’d be happier if you went together,” she said to her sons. “Perhaps Josh will join you.”
“Roberta won’t let him off the lead,” said Tom disdainfully. “And we’re absolutely not having her!”
“It would be nice to ask him, just the same,” their mother insisted.
“I have no reservations about telling him that we won’t tolerate his wife,” said David. “It’s about time he stood up to her.”
“I don’t think she’d want to go, anyway,” interjected Rosamunde. “Doesn’t she prefer to ski in Gstaad?”