The Butterfly Box(193)

‘You’ll regret this for the rest of your life. I won’t take you back. You’ll be sorry,’ he shouted as she walked to where Sam waited for her by the open door of the cab. He smiled at her with pride as she climbed in, then he followed her and closed the door behind him. When he looked up at the window to Molly and Hester’s flat their happy faces grinned at him from behind the glass.



Hester put her thumb up and nodded.



Torquil drove away, the wheels of his Porsche skidding and leaving two black stripes on the tarmac that steamed in fury.

Federica collapsed into the seat, suddenly aware of her trembling hands and legs.

‘Any more of those, Gov?’ asked the cabbie, who had watched the confrontation with relish. ‘That's better than EastEnders, that is.’

To Paddington Station, please,’ said Sam, putting his arm around Federica’s shoulders.

She allowed him to gather her up as she quietly reflected on the last four years of her life with relief and regret.

Federica returned to much celebrating, because not only was it Christmas, but everyone was delighted to have her back again. Ingrid now admitted that she had thought Torquil a ‘ghastly man’ while Toby and Julian confessed that they had only remembered where they had seen him when it was too late to do anything about it. ‘He was arrogant and self-satisfied then,’ they said. ‘We really let you down, Fede.’

Helena was delighted that someone else was as miserable as she was and accompanied her daughter on long walks along the cliffs, lamenting Arthur’s painful silence. ‘I’ve lost him, Fede. He won’t even talk to me,’ she whined.

Jake and Polly gathered her up like they had gathered up her mother. Suddenly the family united in the drama. Polly cooked large vegetable lasagnes and bread and butter puddings and all seven of them sat about the table, surrounded by Jake’s model boats which now hung suspended from the ceiling so they couldn’t be knocked onto the floor by clumsy elbows and hands, drinking large glasses of wine and Polly’s elderflower juice, carrying on four conversations at once.

Federica moved straight back in with Toby and Julian and Rasta, who she’d take out on her long walks with her mother. She helped Toby decorate the rooms for Christmas and Julian took her into town to shop for presents. ‘I don’t have a bean,’ she said, thinking of the mountains of beans she had left in London.

‘I do,’ said Julian happily, ‘and you can have as many as you like.’

She spent as much time at Pickthistle Manor as she did at Toby and Julian’s. The squirrel in Sam’s sweater drawer had woken up before time, so Ingrid had

managed to secure his nest on the top of the Christmas tree, but a family of mice had somehow found their way under Sam’s bed so he had to sleep in one of the spare rooms so as not to disturb them. The two families celebrated Christmas with drinks parties and lunch parties that continued long after the festival was over and the New Year had been toasted in with champagne and embraces.

When Sam hugged Federica he kissed her cheek affectionately and said, This will be your year, Fede. You’ll see.’



She hoped he was right.



Torquil sent her long letters in an attempt to win her back. He wrote about his deep love for her and his regret that he had ever laid eyes on Lucia. ‘Everything I did was for you, because I wanted to protect you. I’m only guilty of caring too much,’ he wrote. At first Federica read them, then as they got increasingly repetitive and pitiful she simply destroyed them unopened. However, one line lingered in her thoughts: ‘I’m only guilty of caring too much.’ Said by the deceiving Torquil it was nothing more than an empty sentence; however, applied to Arthur it was given a whole new meaning.

Federica felt desperately sorry for Arthur, so forgotten amid the destruction of her own marriage. She knew her mother was hard to live with, but she also knew that she desperately cared. After all, she had listened to Helena’s soliloquies of remorse during their long walks on the cliffs. It was time to intervene.

When Arthur saw Federica at his door he initially felt sick with disappointment. He had thought it was Helena. But then his surprise turned to amazement. ‘What are you doing here?’ he asked.

‘I’ve come to apologize, Arthur,’ she replied. He remained in the frame of the door with his mouth agape. ‘Can I come in?’ she asked.

‘Of course. Of course,’ he stammered, standing aside to let her pass. She walked into the kitchen and took her coat off ‘Please sit down, here, let me take this for you,’ he said, draping it over the back of one of the chairs. ‘Tea?’