Old friends of Tomek’s in the village say he was involved with smuggling goods over the border from the former Soviet Union. “In those days it was the wild west, you could get anything across. Guns, cars, women,” they told this newspaper.
Attempts to reach Forrest for comment have been unsuccessful. His literary agent also refused to comment for this article, as did his publisher.
Forrest’s father disappeared not long after his wife left him. It is unclear where he is now. It is also unclear whether he is the father to Julia’s two eldest children, Jakub, and Gosia.
Julia took her children to the Lincolnshire village of Skirting, where she found a job picking strawberries. Within six months, she had remarried to the publican of the village pub, Gary Hearst. The marriage lasted two years before Julia packed up and left in the middle of the night.
The family resettled in Eggleton, outside Grimsby, where Julia once again moved in with a publican. Tony Devizes, the manager of the village’s British Legion, left his wife for Julia. She stayed with him for five years before his drinking and infidelity became too much for her. Relocating out of Lincolnshire, she settled in the Norfolk village of Tattishall and gained her own pub for the first time.
The Beggar’s Cup was a run-down flat-roof pub that had been partially burned down the previous year and needed extensive work and remodelling. Rumours at the time were of an insurance job. The family’s luck began to change. Soon Julia was making a tidy profit, but as her fortunes improved, her children’s turbulent lives began to get worse.
Forrest’s older brother, Jakub, who went by the nickname Kuba, was first arrested at sixteen. By age twenty, he had already served a 30-day stretchfor theft. But then the problems got worse when he was discovered in possession of a hard drive full of indecent images.
I put my phone back in my pocket. I didn’t need to read anymore. I’d lived it. I stood up and looked at myself in the mirror. Tears were running down my face. Most of the time, I’d have instantly brushed them away, determined to try and make myself look less soft, but … I couldn’t face the mirror, and I was too exhausted to even raise my hand.
Everything I’d done to change my life was for nothing. People wanted me back where I’d come from. No one wanted to celebrate my success. They wanted to tear me down because I’d made the mistake of falling for Tarquin.
I have no idea how long I stood at the sink and stared at the mirror before I was able to summon up the energy – or was it the courage? – to exit the bathroom. I put my ear to the door and listened for sounds, but heard nothing. Everyone must have either left or gone to a different room to regroup.
Wondering if I should text Simon and take him up on his offer, I instead made my way out. I saw a door to what I assumed was the kitchen and decided to leave that way. The room was dark, despite dusk being upon us outside. The half-light gave the world a menacing vibe despite the heat.
Outside the kitchen door, an orange dot glowed. I froze.
“Arden, there you are.” Katrina Pettigrew puffed on her cigarette. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to tell anyone I saw you.”
I came up to her and blinked in the small amount of light at the doorway from the dusk outside. Katrina swatted her ciggie smoke away, but I gave a dismissive wave for her not to bother.
“I’m sorry that happened to you,” she said honestly.
“You’re probably the only one. Lots of people will think they did a public service.”
“People never get what they deserve,” she said. “The innocent suffer and the guilty prosper.”
“And I thought I was a cynic.”
“Oh, I’m sure you are. You shouldn’t let this ruin your life, Arden. You’ve got happiness ahead of you. You’re young.”
“I feel a hundred years old.”
“Hey.” She turned serious. “Listen to me. I’ve been there …” Her voice was somewhere far away. “It wasn’t just my husband I lost. My son died a few years before him. I thought I’d never see the light again. I honestly thought I’d never recover. But I did. And if I can make it out of that, then I believe you can make it out of this.”
I was shocked. “I’m sorry. Did-did he …”
“He was a soldier. Twenty-five. Someone didn’t do their job properly, and he suffered the consequences.”
“Where was he posted?”
She laughed. “That’s the worst thing. This happened here in the UK. On base. Anyway, I say this to remind you that life is precious, Arden. You can revel in the misery, or you can keep fighting, and eventually it’ll get better.”
She touched me lightly on the arm. “They’re all in the drawing room listening to Frobisher apologise still. If you want to escape, now is your chance. Do you know the way back from the stile?”
“I think so.” I smiled. “Thanks, Katrina. Have a good evening.”
I walked away from her, heading back towards the stile, lost in my own mind. Behind me the door opened behind me and voices emanated from it. I’d just passed the side of the house with the terraces to my right. It was light enough that everyone could see me. Before I could move, Tommy and Odette were upon me.
“Hello, Arden, where have you been?” Tommy smirked. “Or should I say Arkadiusz?”
“Tommy!” his wife exclaimed and came towards me. “Are you okay?” she asked with genuine concern.
