He felt this as severe recrimination for his self-pity, or chose to take it that way and offered sincerely, ‘I am sorry to hear that. Car?’
Given their recent dispute about brake lines, he immediately wished he could recall that guess, but she replied swiftly, ‘Oh, they’re not dead. Or I don’t think they are. I hope not. I lost them. Literally. We were walking up on Bodmin Moor. Baby’s hat blew off, and I chased it down into this little gully because Chris was carrying her in one of those harness things, and when I got back, they were gone. Search and rescue were out for days, but there was no trace of them. They were never found.’
‘Jesus.’
‘Oh, he wasn’t there that day. That I am sure of.’ She sighed and added, ‘Sorry. It was Christmas Eve. It’s never a good day for me.’
There was a sudden rattling of the outer door in the shop. Perhaps glad of the excuse to end the slightly intimate confessional moment, she jumped up and peered around the kitchen counter.
‘Ah, you have been tracked down. Is that—? What is she wear—?’
‘—don’t ask.’ He rose and shook himself out a little. ‘I wanted to talk about the meeting. We got side-tracked.’
‘How long are you staying down here?’
‘Not long. We have a wedding to attend next weekend.’ He toed the floor for a moment. ‘Have you ever visited Light Island?’
‘No. I heard it was privately owned now. Hard to believe, but true apparently. Some savage recluse bought it. No one seems to return alive.’
This time he managed a genuine smile on both sides. ‘After Christmas then. Sometime this week. Come for dinner. If you would like. If you can get away from the shop…’
‘Don’t feel sorry for me. Please. Never that.’
‘I am not sure I have ever felt sorry for anyone in my entire life.’
She grinned broadly. ‘Yup, that’s what I thought when I first met you—off that Russian trawler.Right bastard, this one. In that case, I’d love to see one of our islands that’s been annexed by a foreign power.’ She went to flip the sign and open the door, greeting Ben with her usual and noticeable preference, and kneeling to Molly and trying to keep a straight face as she admired her.
Ben caught his eye with a questioning expression. He stared back. Then smiled wanly, and it didn’t matter whether the expression was even on both sides. It never had when he smiled at Ben. That’s just the way they were together.
* * *
Chapter Seventeen
It was amazing to Aleksey how four-year-olds could remember and store up the most trivial comments as if they were engraved on tablets of stone, and yet at the same time forget every essential rule or instruction when it suited them. As soon as they were gathered in the huge drawing room, comfortably arranged on the sofas, fire lit, carols playing, tree lights on, obligatory sherry offered and accepted by the grandparents, Molly reminded them all that he had promised she could open any presents—i.e. the ones that were temptingly visible in the bags at Jennifer’s feet—that Grandma had brought for her.
Grandma, much to Aleksey’s delight, had been noticeably quiet since landing at the dock of Light Island. Quite what she’d expected of Guillemot, no one knew, but an Art Deco house to rival any of the National Trust’s (of which she was a life member) was clearly not it. She’d been awed the first time she’d seen the glass house on Dartmoor. But this was different somehow. Not only was Guillemot on its own sub-tropical island, it spoke to her English soul in a way that their Devon house had not. That housewasanachronistic. Aleksey knew this. By and large, the English didn’t build their houses of glass. They really couldn’t afford to, given they lived in a country of almost perpetual drizzle. But this house wasManderley—its essence was in her blood.
The first present, however, was awkward.
It was a little floor-length dress of ruby-red velvet embroidered with gold and green leaves around the sleeves and hem and on the bodice. It was exquisite. Molly had opened it reverently, unfolding the tissue paper in which it was wrapped. But she could not put it on. Could not, would not.Awkward.
The moment brought into the light the unfortunate issue the family had been living with since the nativity play.
Angel Donkey had been a huge success. A roaring success, it could be said. Unintentional laughter at the start but creating a kind of audience contagion of hilarity, which had only egged the mischievous creature on. Aleksey, as good as his word, had bought Molly a costume in lieu of the interpretative imagining her teacher had suggested she adopt. Four-year-olds didn’t do interpretation very well. He’d found it in a theatrical costume shop and had quickly had it refitted for a smaller frame than it had been intended for. Basically, it was a very realistic stuffed donkey—head, body, four legs, tail—and was easily big enough for a child to ride upon, except that with straps that went over the shoulders and with a hole through the body, it was the other way around—the child actually wore the donkey. But being so very small, and the donkey being made for a much larger actor, she had become more animal than human. A fact she had not taken into consideration at the beginning of the play. The critical scene was being acted out in front of a cardboard backdrop of wall and window—Mary being given the good news by the Angel Gabriel. And Molly, waiting behind the window for her chance to escort Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem, had leaned forward to hear what was being said. And so Angel Donkey’s head—a good three feet in front of her—had slowly peered around the window frame. There had only been one donkey to choose from in the shop where Aleksey had bought the costume. Unfortunate for a nativity play, this one was based on the character inShrek. So when Molly had leaned forward, the Angel Gabriel’s great announcement that Mary was now the handmaiden of God had been greeted with an imbecilic grin of cheeky disrespect masked by a faux-whimsical dopiness that fooled no one who’d seen the films. Which was every parent present, obviously.
Aleksey had snorted. He hadn’t been able to help it, despite the severe rib poke he’d received, not from Ben for a change, but from Emilia, who had been drafted in at the last minute to give Donkey the angel part of his new name, but had only really had time to tie tinsel bows around his ears, which had consequently done nothing to add gravitas to the proclamation:The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee. Once he’d laughed, one of the fathers further down the bench had as well. This situation not helped by Molly (clearly realising that Angel Donkey could be seen, and maybe in her mind thinking the unplanned-for peek had ruined her big, dramatic entrance) sharply stepping back, but on hearing laughter once more leaning forward to try and spot the miscreant laughing ather. And so Angel Donkey, rascal that he was, had appeared to be acknowledging his own wit by peeping out again, which had only set the entire audience off.
Aleksey was fairly sure that Molly had not intended to knock Joseph off the stage on their interminable walk along the dusty road to Bethlehem as the songLittle Donkeyhad been sung by the choir of unfortunates not selected for lead roles. But the little boy, chosen for this slightly redundant part in the Christmas story, and yet still courteously offering his arm to his heavily pregnant betrothed, had accidentally nudged Angel Donkey aside to reach the Mother of God. Molly, swinging around to reinsert herself alongside the baby-Jesus bump, had once more forgotten that she swung a dangerous zone at least three feet in diameter, and had consequently caught the little four-year-old with Angel Donkey’s rump, and that was the last anyone had seen or heard of from Joseph. He’d missed the birth. Which was a shame really.
Then, Molly had been on a roll. Inadvertent culling of the divine family or not, she’d clearly got a sense not only of her own power, but of the effect she was having on the audience. Parents, entirely bored unless their own offspring were visible and doing something noteworthy, had been laughing and clapping. At her.
It had gone to Angel Donkey’s head, and he’d decided to substitute for Joseph at the crucial moment of delivery and thus got to usher in the various visitors who’d taken the trouble to attend as well. Having seen what had happened to one of their own, namely the little boy in their class swept from the stage, the shepherds had been extremely wary and had hovered well away from the stable and the baby, their lambs deposited unceremoniously beyond Angel Donkey’s reach. The kings, however, had missed witnessing Joseph’s fate, as presumably they’d still been journeying from afar. One little boy, decked out in velvet with an impressive crown and carrying a large chest full of gold coins had already appeared averse to placing his gift down. The story of Molly’s birthday party treasure must have got around, for they were using chocolate coins in lieu of gold. This little Wise Man, clever enough not to just hand his chocolate over to a baby he didn’t even know, had reluctantly begun to place the chest down when Molly had decided he wasn’t being prompt enough with his gift. Stepping forward, she had yet again forgotten her considerable girth, and so the entire chest, possibly made by some loving parents the previous night and decorated in tin foil and jewels, and obviously quite heavy, had been clipped. Propelled across the space, it had landed squarely in the manger.
Jesus was indeed a good baby and no crying he made, but any wails would have been drowned out anyway by the audience’s reaction to this dramatic retelling of the Christmas story. Aleksey had hardly been able to breathe, and Ben had been no better. He’d had a hand clasped to his mouth as if finding any of this funny would have been blasphemous.
The escape to Egypt had been relatively uneventful after this mishap. Missing her beloved and struggling with the flattened baby Jesus, Mary had appeared only too happy to let Angel Donkey lead the way, and possibly Ben would have survived the ordeal of his daughter and the donkey, had not Aleksey then taken the perfect moment to ask loudly, ‘Are we there yet?’ which had finished off the three rows in front and behind. Even Emilia, who had held out until this last affront, had started choking, and the entire audience had surged to its feet to applaud.
Angel Donkey’s impudent antics had impressed everyone, and all the parents had been highly entertained, but a more fundamental shift had taken place in Molly’s psyche. When they’d gone backstage to retrieve her, she was still in her costume, standing in the wings, staring wistfully out onto the scene of her triumph.
