‘Five months or so. They’d been at a conference together.Sopredictable.’ Emma’s voice is harsh and she can feel her throat aching. ‘She said I should know that Will had put an end to it, and she went on about how Will loved me very much.’ Emma feels the old rage and thinks of the snowdrops she ripped from the rain-sodden garden. ‘That’s the point when, if I’d had a knife on the table, rather than one of those stupid wooden, stirry things, I would have stabbed her.’ Emma’s body shakes in earnest now. ‘He had talked to her about me, toldheraboutus.’
She wants to try and explain to Betty how this betrayal was far worse than her husband screwing another woman. ‘Being with Will changed everything for me, Betty. It was like, here was this world that other people lived in and if I just trusted him I could go there too.’ She looks up at Betty, ‘And itwasdifferent. I began to think he was right. We did things like other couples, had friends, went out for walks, for dinner. I was brave when I was with Will. Everything seemed possible– if I just believed in us…’ She cannot go on but manages to whisper, gratefully, ‘It’s so good to say these things. I think I’ve been going out of my mind.’
‘Well, I’m not bloody surprised.’ Betty’s anger fills the boat and spills over into the water.
Maybe it is the surprise at Betty’s fury, or the warmth emanating from it, but something eases in Emma, and she can feel Betty’s sympathy seeping into the dry, tightly packed layers she has wrapped around her greatest pain.
She reaches out and holds on to the sides of the boat to steady herself. ‘I think about that girl sometimes, Betty, and I wonder, if he’d left me for her, would they have had a baby? Would there be a small boy with sticking-out ears and black, black hair who would have Will’s blood rushing through his veins. Would I have recognised him if I saw him in the park or riding his bike?’ She can almost picture the little boy, pedalling away like crazy. ‘Would he tell bad jokes like his dad, want to learn the drums even though he was crap at it? Would he run like Will did, staring at the horizon like he really believed he could get there?’
Betty tries to say something, but Emma stops her, wanting to get this last part out. ‘I can’t have children, Betty, and Will would have made such a beautiful dad. He would have raced and jumped, sure-footed into fatherhood. I know that. And it just seems so unfair that there’s nothing left of him. And sometimes I can’t make sense of that, so I just look at the flowers and watch them grow and fade and reflower. Even the simplest daisy. If they can do it, why can’t I?’
‘Oh, love.’ Betty’s voice cracks and Emma can tell she is crying. ‘You mustn’t think like that. You have this life, and look what you’ve done with it, all the things you have achieved. And I’m sure your husband loved you.’ She reaches out and pats her hand. ‘Of course he did. Men can besuchfools.’ Again, Betty sounds furious. It is so unlike her, and Emma is reminded of Roberto’s anger at the tapas bar. ‘And look what you’re doing now– you’ve become a florist and then there’s the book you’re going to write…’
‘You really think I can do that? I’ve not really thought it through, and I can’t even find the person I’m looking for.’ She almost says ‘people’, and the image of The Nurse and a blurry figure hidden behind flowers come into her mind. Who exactly is she looking for? Who does she want to find?
Betty pours them both another coffee and then rows them slowly back to the boathouse. Soon, Betty has clearly had enough of silence. Question follows question, and the journey back begins to remind Emma of their drive to Stamford.
To start with, Emma finds it hard– Betty’s only area of interest appears to be her life with Will. But her enquires are gentle, focused on the smaller details of their life together: what books he’d liked; where they’d gone on holiday; the kinds of meals they’d shared. As Emma retrieves these small isolated memories, jigsaw pieces of their life together, she finds comfort in examining the disparate fragments. Taken individually, each tiny part makes sense to her in a way that the huge truth of Will’s infidelity doesn’t.
She looks at the woman rowing opposite her and thinks about how much she underestimated Betty when they first met. She recalls the interview when she spoke in clichés– and she smiles slightly; perhaps Les picked her for the job.
So, she keeps answering Betty’s questions. She doesn’t think these enquiries about Will are magically turning a key, but maybe they are oiling a lock.
As they approach the boathouse, Emma leans across to her friend. ‘I don’t make you nervous, do I, Betty? Not now, surely?’
‘No,’ Betty tells her, ‘I don’t think you ever really did, love, but sometimes you can be very reserved, and I’m not always good with silences.’
‘What does Les say?’ Emma suddenly wants to know.
‘Oh, you know Les…’ Betty pauses for a moment. ‘He says, “still waters run deep”.’
They look at each other and both start to laugh until the boat rocks beneath them.
Chapter 40
Violet
Lily
The varnish on the ship’s rail is blistered from the sun. The decks are bleached like driftwood. The night’s breeze is soft and warm, but the stars above her look cold and hard as ice. She wonders if they have names or are too tiny and numerous to be christened.
Her mother believes in christening all God’s creations, however small they are. She suspects her mother would name the stars after the saints, although she thinks even her mother would run out of saints before naming them all.
She wonders if she will ever have a child of her own to name. She would like a little girl, she thinks, but maybe that is because she misses the weight of her sister on her lap, the feel of her cheek against hers. She does not want to replace her sister and does not think she could love her own child more, but she feels deep inside her a yeaning that sometimes catches her unawares, like when a wave appears from nowhere out of the calm ocean. Then something shifts inside, a sudden longing at the heart of her.
If she were to have a baby girl, she thinks she would name her after a flower, however much her mother would line up the saints in front of her for inspection. She might even be brave enough to turn down the blessed Virgin’s name (her mother’s ace). She does not want to hold a ‘Mary’ in her arms. Instead she thinks of ‘Rose’ or possibly ‘Daisy’. Her choice of name changes like the seasons: ‘Primrose’ appearing in the spring, ‘Lavender’ in the summer and ‘Marigold’ when the fields ripen to gold.
Standing on the deck, the latent heat radiating from the wood beneath her hand, she thinks of a little girl in a white dress, called Lily.
Chapter 41
Emma
Sweet Peas
That evening Emma and Betty walk past the scarlet door of the tapas bar. She’s glad Betty said she fancied Italian so she doesn’t have to feel guilty about not eating at Roberto’s bar. She intends to call in and thank Roberto, but she doesn’t think she can face it just yet. She doesn’t know if she could ever look at the Baobab tree again, much less sit at it.
She asked if Clem wanted to join them, but Betty says it’s her wedding anniversary, and she and her husband have gone away for a few days.
