11.Shadows: Part One

Bertie had accompanied her across the field to the manor, his canine snuffling a pleasant accompaniment to the brisk air and sound of her own feet ringing against the hard earth. A sudden frost had left everything with a layer of white that had remained unchanged all day and now, with the lowering sun red, a mist was rising, threading through the trees.

Audrey skirted the terrace, pulling the french windows to the library a little wider. The room was dim, the fire low and giving only a faint glow. It looked empty and Audrey was about to head for the front door when she saw the figure, motionless, on the sofa. She tapped softly.

'Richard?'

He looked up, gazed at her for a moment as though not really seeing her and then smiled, stood.

'Audrey. This is a nice surprise. Come in.'

Bertie was ahead of her, trotting over to Richard for a scratch behind the ears before taking himself over to the fireplace, turning around three times and then flopping down on the hearth rug.

'You can also make yourself at home,' he said to her, eyes crinkling with amusement.

'Bertie ispresumptuous,' Audrey stated, regarding the beagle critically.

'Can't imagine where he gets it from.'

'What was that?'

'Drink?'

'Please.'

A sherry for her, a whisky for himself, and Richard joined her on the sofa. 'What can I do for you?'

He raised his cigar to his lips, head tilted, watching her through the smoke, dark eyes glittering. It was a simple gesture but she was caught by the graceful economy of his movement, caught again by the well-shaped hand with the long fingers. He had the fine hands of a musician, not a businessman. She imagined their strength, remembered the feeling of them raking through her hair-

Audrey shook herself, collected her thoughts by burrowing through her handbag. 'I was just bringing you these.'

A handful of receipts from the parish council. Something that could have been put in an envelope and dropped through the letterbox. Nothing that necessitated a tramp across the field.

He took them from her. 'Thanks, I'll just, er…' He stood, crossing to a table and securing them under a paperweight. It was getting dark, he realised, and there was a shocking draft coming from the open windows. Richard moved around the room, drawing curtains, flicking on a lamp.

Audrey felt herself relaxing into the warmth, aided by the exceptionally good sherry. Richard had always been a considerate and generous host. Her gaze drifted to the coffee table in front of her; its surface was covered in leather backed albums and photographs.

'Reorganising?' she asked.

'Mother,' he replied, over his shoulder, coaxing the fire back into a semblance of life. 'Every now and then she goes into one of her nostalgic moods.'

'I love old family photographs,' Audrey said – a statement that would surprise no-one. She leaned forward and her eye was taken by a young couple captured in sepia tones. They wore the serious expressions that people always had in those pictures. The clothes and the girl's waved hair placed them in the 1930s, but there was no question who they were. Mrs Poo had been a remarkably pretty girl, Audrey thought, looking at a sweet, fresh face. You could still see the humour in her eyes, despite the solemnity of her expression. Her husband, standing behind her seated figure, with one hand on her shoulder, had been a big man. The same broad shoulders and musician's hands that his son had inherited.

She replaced the photo, picked up another that had caught her attention. Richard, clean-shaven and short-haired, but unmistakable. A white flower in his buttonhole and the girl on his arm in a bridal gown. His wedding day. They were both beaming at the camera, faces alive with happiness and hope.

Her own wedding photos also showed a smiling couple, but they were the polite, socially-required smiles that didn't reach their eyes. This pair glowed, clearly revelling in the joy of one another.

All that Audrey knew of Richard's wife was that she had died, and that her name had been Anna. And that detail was courtesy of Mrs Polouvicka. For someone as expansive as Richard seemed, there was a lot that he didn't talk about, she realised.

She studied the image. So, this was Anna. A strikingly beautiful face, strong yet fine-boned. A cloud of black hair and eyes as dark and lustrous as her husband's. They were a handsome couple.

Audrey stirred the pile of photos, picked up another. Anna DeVere, standing in a garden, smiling, squinting slightly against the sun in her eyes, and very obviously heavily pregnant.

'Richard! I didn't know you had any children.' She knew. Before she had finished the sentence, certainly before she looked up and saw the expression in his eyes, she knew. It was clear in his face, a deep, old, hurt.

Of all the stupid, ridiculous things to say, she told herself, savagely.

Standing behind the sofa, he was looking over her shoulder at the photograph that she now held between her fingers as though it burnt. He let out a long breath and when he spoke his voice was gentle.

'She only lived for twelve hours. Not much of a life. We named her Theresa.'

'Richard, I… I am so sorry.'

'It was a long time ago, now.'

Why didn't he tell her to mind her own business and go? But he kept talking, his voice slow and soft and she couldn't bring herself to meet his eyes. 'It was a difficult birth and…' He let out another breath. 'Well, we couldn't have children after that.'

It was the 'we' that got her. Can't possibly be me, Old Girl, had been Marton's pronouncement, and that had been that, despite all the doctors telling her that there was no reason why shecouldn't conceive.

Richard moved around the sofa and she felt his weight settle beside her. Audrey glanced at him; he was looking at Anna's photograph and there was a small smile playing about his lips. Audrey's own felt dry and she moistened them before saying cautiously, 'You never talk about her.'

He considered this for a few moments. 'Well, it's difficult talking about someone to people who never knew her. I'd known Anna since we were children.'

Somehow it wasn't quite the image she'd had. 'Childhood sweethearts?'

He blinked, slowly, his eyes refocusing as though pulling back from a memory. 'No… No, actually. We were friends- Well, I was friends with her brother, but we were friendly. Then we lost touch for a long time. We met again by chance; she was doing some modelling work.'

Of course she was, Audrey thought, looking again at the exquisite structure of her face.

Richard let out a laugh. 'She was advertising cheese, I seem to remember.'

'Cheese?'

'Yes, they were heady days.' Another smile. 'We had a mutual photographer friend, that's how it came about. My big in was asking to hire her for a shoot and she promptly argued me into the most exorbitant price. She had a better head for business than I do.'

Warmth, admiration in his voice, in his face. He had loved this woman. Was that reason he had left London, Audrey wondered – he simply couldn't bear to be in the place where she no longer was?

'I think that's what I miss the most – someone you can talk to about anything.' He paused and then added almost apologetically, 'But you know all about that.'

Audrey met a non-committal sound in the back of her throat. Finally, she put the picture back on top of the pile.

There was silence for a time and then Richard roused himself, nimble fingers flicking through the photographs until he found what he was looking for.

'If you need a good laugh, feast your eyes on this handsome chap. There.' He presented it to her with a flourish and Audrey did indeed burst out laughing. Richard sat back, taking a draw on his cigar and evidently enjoying her amusement.

'The caption for that should be "My First Fruit Stall",' he said. 'Not the first one that I worked on, but the first one that was actually mine.'

'How old are you here?'

'Sixteen.'

'It's a very fetching cap.' She failed to keep the tremor out of her voice.

'Yes, as a barrow boy you have to wear those by law.'

'Really?'

He looked at her scathingly through wreaths of cigar smoke.

'Oh.' She remembered an earlier conversation. 'Was this the era of Freddie?'

Richard grimaced. 'That was the end of Freddie, thank God.'

Audrey studied the photograph closely, marvelling at how the skinny boy with the wicked grin had transformed himself into the debonair sophisticate sitting beside her.

Sixteen. She had laughed at first, but it wasn't actually funny. He had just been a child, really. 'Wasn't there something you wanted to be?'

'What do you mean?'

'Didn't you have dreams of what you wanted to be when you grew up?'

'Train driver,' he said promptly.

'I'm serious!'

'So am I! It was what all self-respecting boys wanted to be. I still have my dreams: make enough money to buy the railways, then drive trains up and down the country.'

Audrey shook her head. 'You do talk such nonsense.'

He grinned at her.

And it was a neat deflection, she thought. And wondered if he was regretting how far he had let her in. If he did, it didn't show and Audrey allowed herself to be persuaded to stay for dinner. Mrs Polouvicka was, predictably, delighted – even more so when told that Audrey had seen some of the old photographs. The after-dinner entertainment, as a result, was Mrs Polouvicka giving Audrey an enthusiastic guide to the family history, with visual aids. Richard observed most of this from the sidelines, offering the occasional sardonic comment.

But the image that stayed with her the longest was of Richard sitting in the gathering gloom, alone with his shadows.