Part One Hundred And Three
George's feeling of depression continued. She didn't seem to have the energy to drag herself out of it this time. It was like she was being persistently pulled down and down below the surface of the waters of misery. She'd kept up the pretence of outward cheerfulness on the phone with John, but she doubted whether it had really worked. John more than anyone had always been able to penetrate her defenses, see right through her mask of indifference to the feelings that were swamping her. Through Tuesday and Wednesday, it only became harder to maintain the act. She was like a wild animal, who knew that the winter was approaching and simply wanted to crawl in to its hole to hide, maybe even to die. She'd needed what John had given her last week, more than she liked to admit, but that didn't mean she should have done it. John had temporarily pulled her out of the downward spiral she seemed destined to tread, only to fling her back on course, with the added force of guilt to accelerate her progress in to her old destructive behaviour. She knew that what she was doing to herself was odd, wrong even, but it helped. She needed the force of willpower that it took to maintain her old desperate standby, in order to reassure herself that her life wasn't entirely out of her control. Like the vast majority of people who suffer from depression and other anxiety-related states of being George did her best to hide her lowest moments from anyone around her. It would have been a mark of her lack of self-control if she'd ever revealed any of this to anyone. But John had nearly always seen through her, damn him. She'd usually found it impossible to hide how she really felt from him, except perhaps during that time just after Charlie was born and he was so besotted with his daughter that he totally failed to see what was happening under his very nose.
In the middle of Wednesday afternoon, it dawned on her that her father was coming over for dinner. She'd almost forgotten, even though Daddy had come over for dinner on Wednesdays since time immemorial. Picking up the phone, she reached him on his mobile, and his continual inability to understand how it worked made her smile for the first time since Neil's visit.
"Daddy, it's George. Change of plan, can I come over to you this evening instead?"
"Yes, I don't see why not."
"I'll still cook, but I need to get out of the house." Saying that she'd be over about seven, George ended the call, wondering if her father might listen to her. She needed to attempt to make some sense of this with someone, and it looked like her father was all she had left. She didn't always want to hear what he had to say, but he was always honest with her, some might even say brutally honest. But that's what she needed.
She went to the supermarket on her way home, and not being able to come up with any inspiration for what to cook him, she simply picked up her father's three favourite foods, smoked salmon, steak and strawberries, with appropriate accompaniments. She had absolutely no desire to eat food of any kind, but she would be forced to make an effort in front of Daddy, so that he wouldn't start asking awkward questions. When she arrived, and parked her car next to his on the gravel drive, it was done with slightly less of her usual flourish. As she let herself in, she was greeted by his magnificent shaggy blue lurcher. Her father always went hunting and shooting with this dog, but George had caught him on more than one occasion feeding it extras. She was able to let herself straight in to the house, because when she'd married John, her father had made her keep her door key. He'd said that this was still her home, there if she ever needed a bolthole. Had Daddy had some premonition of what would eventually happen between her and John, she never knew. She hadn't ever taken him up on this long standing offer, but it was always nice to know she had somewhere else to go if necessary.
"Daddy," She called, first putting the Tescos carrier bags in the kitchen.
"I'm in here," Replied Joe Channing's deep, sonorous voice. She found him in his study at the back of the house. Study? Den was probably a more accurate description. This was the room where Joe kept all his law books, and an enormous mahogany desk together with a large armchair and a small drinks cabinet. There was a picture of George and her mother on the wall opposite his desk, and George knew he often looked up at it as he worked. He was sitting in the armchair reading the paper.
"Hello," She said, leaning over to kiss his cheek. "How are you?"
"Reading about more of Deed's controversial decisions. I think he sets out to purposefully annoy the rest of the judiciary." George grinned. It was nice to be back in familiar surroundings, to be with her father, whose reactions to change would forever be the same. "Ah yes," Said Joe, appearing to remember something. "And I heard a rumour floating round the Lord Chancellor's department that you were persuaded to visit one of Her Majesty's prisons last week."
"Ah," Said George, feeling as though she was fifteen again, and having to confess to some minor misdemeanour or indiscretion.
"You look as guilty as the time I discovered you had been seducing my gardener when you were seventeen," Said Joe, a slight smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. Remembering the utter humiliation of the conversation that had followed this discovery, George couldn't help blushing as she laughed. Good God, she thought, that was thirty years ago. Seducing one of Daddy's servants had simply been a new form of entertainment to while away the long summer holidays. Then she became serious.
"I got in to an argument with John in court, and he held me in contempt."
"Might I remind you that this is the third time you've done this," Said her father, looking at her sternly.
"Yes, thank you, Daddy, but I know that. He and someone, who is probably destined to become his next conquest, came up with the idea of my seeing inside a prison, seeing the parts of a prison that barristers don't normally see. So, I spent part of Thursday shadowing a wing governor from Her Majesty's Prison Larkhall."
"Larkhall, isn't that the prison where that Pilkinton woman constructed a bomb?"
"The very same. The woman I shadowed, and who helped the Deed come up with the idea in the first place was one of the prosecution witnesses for that trial, Karen Betts."
Whilst she prepared their meal, she told him some of the highlights of her brief time behind bars.
"I was offered a gin and tonic by one of the inmates," She said, removing the stalks from the strawberries before putting them in the fridge.
"I trust you didn't accept it?" Asked Joe, not entirely certain of the answer he would get.
"Of course," She said, "I could hardly do otherwise with the wing governor not so far away. Oh, and I met a prostitute who sends her son to your old school."
"What!" Joe almost choked on his pre-dinner whisky. George grinned.
"I knew you'd be like that. Yes, one David Saunders has a mother serving time at Her Majesty's pleasure."
"This country's going to the dogs," Grumbled Joe.
"Oh, don't be like that, Daddy. It's better than him ending up in a similar place to his mother."
"Well," Said Joe, his voice rumbling like threatening thunder. "It shouldn't happen. The son of a prostitute going to a school like that. It just isn't on."
"You used to say that about John," Said George thoughtfully. "I remember, when I said that I was going to marry him, you said that you didn't want your daughter marrying some baker's boy who'd risen to heights he couldn't possibly maintain."
"Yes, and I was right wasn't I."
"About our marriage, maybe. But you can't say the same about his career, which was your point of argument at the time." Joe briefly found himself cursing the day he'd ever encouraged his daughter to become an advocate for the law. It gave her far too many skills in argumentative tactics.
They sat at the worn oak kitchen table to eat. It wasn't often Joe used the dining-room any more. This reminded George of the happy mealtimes of her childhood, and those very quiet, not so happy ones after her mother had been killed in a car crash when she was ten. George could remember her mother baking bread at this table. Even though her mother had married an up and coming barrister, destined one day to be a judge and then a law lord, this hadn't meant that she had been willing to relinquish the art of cooking for her family to any random servant. George could also remember the occasions when, after a day's shooting, her father would clean his gun at this table, and her mother would shout at him for cluttering up her workspace. George ate very sparingly, surreptitiously feeding most of her steak to a slavering lurcher.
"You spoil that dog rotten," Her father commented.
"No more than you do," replied George with a smile.
"You don't eat enough," Added Joe, "Hardly enough to feed a sparrow, and you're looking thinner than is really good for you." George opened her mouth to argue with him, but shut it again, biting her tongue to prevent her from justifying her decrease in size. Joe seemed almost to be waiting for some sort of objection to his comment.
"Is something wrong?" He asked after a while.
"Why?" She asked, always with the irritating habit of answering a question with a question.
"Usually if I comment on the amount your eating, or not eating in this case, I get a barrage of protestation to the effect that you are perfectly all right and that it isn't any of my business." George gave him a brief, tired-looking smile.
"You, John, and even Neil, blast him, keep saying it. I'm tired of arguing." He fixed his gaze on her with all the fatherly assurance of thinking that he could read her like a book.
"George, you never get tired of arguing. It's how you live, I'd even go as far as to say it's how you survive."
"Daddy, let's not continue this conversation." Joe looked exasperated.
"That cabinet minister of yours must be rubbing off on you if avoiding any kind of confrontation is now your best line of defence." George visibly winced.
"I doubt it," She said, some of the familiar bite returning to her tone. "Seeing as he left a few weeks ago." Joe looked surprised.
"Well, I can't say I'm not pleased. I was talking to Deed about him not so long ago."
"Oh, he didn't tell me," Said George, wondering just what John had told her father.
"Yes, just after that ludicrous trial of the couple who very successfully bombed that prison you went to see." George slightly relaxed. There was every possibility that her father wasn't aware of what Neil had done to her.
"Well, you don't need to worry any more," She said. "He's gone, and he won't be coming back."
"What happened? Or is fatherly interest not permitted on this occasion." George smiled. He would show fatherly interest whether it was wanted or not. But she couldn't quite hide the slight tremor in her voice when she said,
"You don't need to know, Daddy. It's not important."
"By the look on your face, I would dare to disagree. Clearly it is important."
"Daddy, I mean it. This isn't up for discussion." Her voice had risen slightly, taking on the edge of panic that he hadn't heard in her since he'd tried to talk to her about why his one and only grandchild was living full time with Deed, not with her. Seeing that his perseverance would be fruitless, Joe abandoned this topic of conversation while they finished their meal and George stacked the plates in the dishwasher.
When they were seated in the lounge, George joined her father in an after dinner cigarette.
"At least your taking up this habit again means you won't prevent me from smoking in your house and banish me to the terrace," Said her father with a smile.
"I think I started again just to annoy Neil," Replied George dryly. "But then the addiction kicks in and letting go isn't so easy." Joe was inclined to think that she was talking about something far more serious than smoking, but as she didn't elaborate, he decided not to probe.
"Daddy, can I tell you something?" Asked George, feeling the urge to confess suddenly becoming unbearably strong.
"Do I want to hear it?" Asked Joe, knowing that for her to ask, it must be something serious.
"Probably not," George conceded, "But I expect you'll tell me how stupid I am, and maybe that's what I need to hear."
"I am as ever, intrigued," Replied Joe, raising his eyebrows.
"I've done something incredibly silly," George began. Realising by her tone who this must involve, Joe said,
"Are you seeing Deed again?" George almost laughed. Perhaps her father really did know her as well as he thought he did.
"No," She said, "At least, not exactly." This was her father after all, and she found it almost impossible to find the words necessary to explain exactly how John had come back in to the picture. Observing a hint of embarrassment in her face, Joe got up and walked to the sideboard, pouring himself a whisky and her a glass of Martini. With his back to her, he said,
"George, going to bed with one's ex, is never a good idea."
"I know," Said George miserably. "But I think I needed cheering up."
"And Deed will never say no to a beautiful woman," Added Joe, handing George her drink and sitting down on the sofa next to her. "But why now," Joe persisted, "why suddenly now, when as far as I'm aware, this hasn't happened since you were married to Deed." George turned her face slightly away from her father. Even now, even after all these years, she still found it extremely hard to talk to him about anything vaguely personal. Observing her difficulty, Joe turned her face so that she was forced to look at him.
"Now, you listen to me," He said quietly but firmly. "Your mother ought to be saying things like this to you, but as she isn't here, this parental duty falls to me. There isn't much I don't know about you and Deed, and what I don't know, I would suggest that I neither need nor want to know. So, talk."
"I don't know where to start," Said George, realising that her instinct to confess all to Daddy had after all been the right one.
"Start with Haughton, because I think I'm right in suggesting that this has something to do with him."
"You're determined to get this out of me, aren't you."
"Yes." Feeling thoroughly ashamed of what Neil had done to her, George turned her gaze away from him.
"Neil gave me a black eye," She said, mentally preparing herself for Joe's reaction.
"What!" The bark of fury made George inwardly retreat. "When did this happen?" Joe continued.
"You remember the last time Neil was there when you came over for dinner, about a month ago? Well, after you'd gone, we got in to an argument about why I couldn't achieve a not guilty verdict for Pilkinton and Atkins. You know me, Daddy, I always have to have the last word, and it appeared to be one insult too many."
"That's absolutely no excuse. If there's one thing a man never does it's to ever strike his woman." Briefly smiling at her father's insistence, George said,
Well, it seems he doesn't agree with you."
"What happened?"
"I drove away like a bat out of hell."
"Where did you go?" Asked Joe, thinking that he could work out the rest.
"I stayed with John."
"Why didn't you come here?"
"It's stupid, I know, but I was ashamed. I didn't want you to see me like that."
"What was Deed's reaction?"
"He let me stay there, and when Neil came to court the next day to try and talk to me, John held him up against the wall and threatened to see him doing time in the scrubs if he ever did anything like that to me again." Joe smiled broadly.
"Quite right too." Then a thought seemed to occur to him. "Was that when?..." He didn't seem able to voice the words, you slept with him.
"No, of course not," Replied George in defence of John's complete sensitivity on that night. "Not even John is that presumptuous. Daddy, don't be angry with John for this. It was me who went to him in the first place. He was good to me when I needed it, and that's all there is too it."
"But why the need to confess? It's something you've always avoided wherever possible." The dredging up of the real reason why her two evenings with John were getting to her so much, brought tears to George's eyes.
"I feel guilty," She said, unable to keep the tears at bay any longer. His daughter looked so desolate, so miserable, that Joe put aside his usual avoidance of displays of affection and put a strong, comforting arm round her shoulders.
"What's there to feel guilty about?" He asked softly, digging in his pocket for the clean handkerchief that perpetually resided there. "Deed is quite capable of refusing. Just because he never does, is hardly something you should feel guilty about."
"Not about him," Said George disgustedly, "I feel guilty about Jo, Jo Mills."
"Well, if we're talking about two people who certainly shouldn't be having a clandestine affair, it's Deed and Jo Mills. That is, after all, why she was brought up in front of the Professional Conduct Committee."
"Daddy, that's not the point and you know it. She and I have discovered some common ground lately, even managed to be civil to each other for more than five minutes. We've been working together on this case I'm forming against Prison Service area management. We seem to have put aside all the old points of friction, and then I go and do this to her." She took her father's handkerchief and wiped away her tears, loathing herself for revealing how weak she was to him.
"Mrs. Mills is another one who is quite capable of looking after herself," Put in Joe, not quite able to get his head round his daughter's new way of thinking.
"I know," Said George, "I just feel so wrong."
"Now listen," Said her father firmly. "Yes, maybe with hindsight, you shouldn't have slept with Deed again, but as long as you don't intend to repeat that event, you're only course of action is to forget it and move on. Jo Mills need never know about it. Deed is hardly likely to tell her, now is he."
"I know. I just wasn't expecting to feel like this."
"The only guilt I'm concerned about this evening," Said Joe, some of his old bluster returning, "Is that of Haughton for daring to raise a hand to my daughter. If this were two centuries ago, I'd have him clapped in irons." George smiled.
"There's nothing anyone can do about a man like him," She said resignedly, "He's gone from my life now, and he won't be coming back. Please, just forget it." Giving his daughter a look that clearly said, how can I, Joe got up to refill their drinks.
"So," He said, "Tell me more about this case against the prison service." As George filled him in, she still had a nagging doubt about what her father might do to Neil, and her guilt about Jo certainly wasn't in any danger of abating.
When the topic of the case had been exhausted, George went quiet for a moment.
"Daddy," She suddenly said, "Have I failed you?" He stared at her.
"What sort of a question is that. Of course not."
"Are you sure?" Asked George, desperately needing the kind of reassurance that only a parent can provide, and which far too many don't.
"George, I couldn't possibly have been more proud of you than I am," Said Joe, this being something he'd never been afraid of saying to his one and only child. "Yes, you've made the odd mistake in your life, but so do we all. The important thing is that you've come through them and moved on."
"There's one thing you're conveniently forgetting in all this," Said George, the alcohol she'd consumed making her able to voice this so hard to deal with of all her failures. "You can't exactly say I made a success of being a mother, can you." Wondering where this had suddenly come from, Joe fixed his daughter with a worried gaze.
"George, anything I may have said at the time, was buried and forgotten about long ago. No, I didn't and still can't understand why you felt the way you did when Charlie was born, but that didn't and hasn't and never will make me love you any less." George didn't know how to respond to this. "When you and Deed went your separate ways," He continued, "I remember having a very long argument with him about why Charlie was living with him and not you. At the time, I said that a child's place was with her mother, but Deed defended you on that point to the end. He couldn't have fought more for you that evening than if he'd been defending you in court. I still don't understand a lot of what he said during that battle of wills, but he managed to convince me that for you, it was the right thing to do."
"He never told me you'd talked to him about it," Said George, feeling an overwhelming gratitude for John's having defended her failure so vehemently.
"I'm not surprised," Replied Joe, remembering some of the harsh things he'd said to John, both on the subject of George's inability to care for her child, and of John's infidelity. A while later when George drove home, perhaps with too much alcohol inside her, she shed a few tears for the times she'd lost with John. He might have treated her badly in his continual conquest of other women, but he had stood by her when she'd failed to do the thing that she thought should come naturally to any mother. She would be eternally grateful to him for that. She just wished that she didn't still need him for the kind of thing he'd given her last week, for the way he could always make her feel safe, and, she realised, for the love she wished he still had for her.
George's feeling of depression continued. She didn't seem to have the energy to drag herself out of it this time. It was like she was being persistently pulled down and down below the surface of the waters of misery. She'd kept up the pretence of outward cheerfulness on the phone with John, but she doubted whether it had really worked. John more than anyone had always been able to penetrate her defenses, see right through her mask of indifference to the feelings that were swamping her. Through Tuesday and Wednesday, it only became harder to maintain the act. She was like a wild animal, who knew that the winter was approaching and simply wanted to crawl in to its hole to hide, maybe even to die. She'd needed what John had given her last week, more than she liked to admit, but that didn't mean she should have done it. John had temporarily pulled her out of the downward spiral she seemed destined to tread, only to fling her back on course, with the added force of guilt to accelerate her progress in to her old destructive behaviour. She knew that what she was doing to herself was odd, wrong even, but it helped. She needed the force of willpower that it took to maintain her old desperate standby, in order to reassure herself that her life wasn't entirely out of her control. Like the vast majority of people who suffer from depression and other anxiety-related states of being George did her best to hide her lowest moments from anyone around her. It would have been a mark of her lack of self-control if she'd ever revealed any of this to anyone. But John had nearly always seen through her, damn him. She'd usually found it impossible to hide how she really felt from him, except perhaps during that time just after Charlie was born and he was so besotted with his daughter that he totally failed to see what was happening under his very nose.
In the middle of Wednesday afternoon, it dawned on her that her father was coming over for dinner. She'd almost forgotten, even though Daddy had come over for dinner on Wednesdays since time immemorial. Picking up the phone, she reached him on his mobile, and his continual inability to understand how it worked made her smile for the first time since Neil's visit.
"Daddy, it's George. Change of plan, can I come over to you this evening instead?"
"Yes, I don't see why not."
"I'll still cook, but I need to get out of the house." Saying that she'd be over about seven, George ended the call, wondering if her father might listen to her. She needed to attempt to make some sense of this with someone, and it looked like her father was all she had left. She didn't always want to hear what he had to say, but he was always honest with her, some might even say brutally honest. But that's what she needed.
She went to the supermarket on her way home, and not being able to come up with any inspiration for what to cook him, she simply picked up her father's three favourite foods, smoked salmon, steak and strawberries, with appropriate accompaniments. She had absolutely no desire to eat food of any kind, but she would be forced to make an effort in front of Daddy, so that he wouldn't start asking awkward questions. When she arrived, and parked her car next to his on the gravel drive, it was done with slightly less of her usual flourish. As she let herself in, she was greeted by his magnificent shaggy blue lurcher. Her father always went hunting and shooting with this dog, but George had caught him on more than one occasion feeding it extras. She was able to let herself straight in to the house, because when she'd married John, her father had made her keep her door key. He'd said that this was still her home, there if she ever needed a bolthole. Had Daddy had some premonition of what would eventually happen between her and John, she never knew. She hadn't ever taken him up on this long standing offer, but it was always nice to know she had somewhere else to go if necessary.
"Daddy," She called, first putting the Tescos carrier bags in the kitchen.
"I'm in here," Replied Joe Channing's deep, sonorous voice. She found him in his study at the back of the house. Study? Den was probably a more accurate description. This was the room where Joe kept all his law books, and an enormous mahogany desk together with a large armchair and a small drinks cabinet. There was a picture of George and her mother on the wall opposite his desk, and George knew he often looked up at it as he worked. He was sitting in the armchair reading the paper.
"Hello," She said, leaning over to kiss his cheek. "How are you?"
"Reading about more of Deed's controversial decisions. I think he sets out to purposefully annoy the rest of the judiciary." George grinned. It was nice to be back in familiar surroundings, to be with her father, whose reactions to change would forever be the same. "Ah yes," Said Joe, appearing to remember something. "And I heard a rumour floating round the Lord Chancellor's department that you were persuaded to visit one of Her Majesty's prisons last week."
"Ah," Said George, feeling as though she was fifteen again, and having to confess to some minor misdemeanour or indiscretion.
"You look as guilty as the time I discovered you had been seducing my gardener when you were seventeen," Said Joe, a slight smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. Remembering the utter humiliation of the conversation that had followed this discovery, George couldn't help blushing as she laughed. Good God, she thought, that was thirty years ago. Seducing one of Daddy's servants had simply been a new form of entertainment to while away the long summer holidays. Then she became serious.
"I got in to an argument with John in court, and he held me in contempt."
"Might I remind you that this is the third time you've done this," Said her father, looking at her sternly.
"Yes, thank you, Daddy, but I know that. He and someone, who is probably destined to become his next conquest, came up with the idea of my seeing inside a prison, seeing the parts of a prison that barristers don't normally see. So, I spent part of Thursday shadowing a wing governor from Her Majesty's Prison Larkhall."
"Larkhall, isn't that the prison where that Pilkinton woman constructed a bomb?"
"The very same. The woman I shadowed, and who helped the Deed come up with the idea in the first place was one of the prosecution witnesses for that trial, Karen Betts."
Whilst she prepared their meal, she told him some of the highlights of her brief time behind bars.
"I was offered a gin and tonic by one of the inmates," She said, removing the stalks from the strawberries before putting them in the fridge.
"I trust you didn't accept it?" Asked Joe, not entirely certain of the answer he would get.
"Of course," She said, "I could hardly do otherwise with the wing governor not so far away. Oh, and I met a prostitute who sends her son to your old school."
"What!" Joe almost choked on his pre-dinner whisky. George grinned.
"I knew you'd be like that. Yes, one David Saunders has a mother serving time at Her Majesty's pleasure."
"This country's going to the dogs," Grumbled Joe.
"Oh, don't be like that, Daddy. It's better than him ending up in a similar place to his mother."
"Well," Said Joe, his voice rumbling like threatening thunder. "It shouldn't happen. The son of a prostitute going to a school like that. It just isn't on."
"You used to say that about John," Said George thoughtfully. "I remember, when I said that I was going to marry him, you said that you didn't want your daughter marrying some baker's boy who'd risen to heights he couldn't possibly maintain."
"Yes, and I was right wasn't I."
"About our marriage, maybe. But you can't say the same about his career, which was your point of argument at the time." Joe briefly found himself cursing the day he'd ever encouraged his daughter to become an advocate for the law. It gave her far too many skills in argumentative tactics.
They sat at the worn oak kitchen table to eat. It wasn't often Joe used the dining-room any more. This reminded George of the happy mealtimes of her childhood, and those very quiet, not so happy ones after her mother had been killed in a car crash when she was ten. George could remember her mother baking bread at this table. Even though her mother had married an up and coming barrister, destined one day to be a judge and then a law lord, this hadn't meant that she had been willing to relinquish the art of cooking for her family to any random servant. George could also remember the occasions when, after a day's shooting, her father would clean his gun at this table, and her mother would shout at him for cluttering up her workspace. George ate very sparingly, surreptitiously feeding most of her steak to a slavering lurcher.
"You spoil that dog rotten," Her father commented.
"No more than you do," replied George with a smile.
"You don't eat enough," Added Joe, "Hardly enough to feed a sparrow, and you're looking thinner than is really good for you." George opened her mouth to argue with him, but shut it again, biting her tongue to prevent her from justifying her decrease in size. Joe seemed almost to be waiting for some sort of objection to his comment.
"Is something wrong?" He asked after a while.
"Why?" She asked, always with the irritating habit of answering a question with a question.
"Usually if I comment on the amount your eating, or not eating in this case, I get a barrage of protestation to the effect that you are perfectly all right and that it isn't any of my business." George gave him a brief, tired-looking smile.
"You, John, and even Neil, blast him, keep saying it. I'm tired of arguing." He fixed his gaze on her with all the fatherly assurance of thinking that he could read her like a book.
"George, you never get tired of arguing. It's how you live, I'd even go as far as to say it's how you survive."
"Daddy, let's not continue this conversation." Joe looked exasperated.
"That cabinet minister of yours must be rubbing off on you if avoiding any kind of confrontation is now your best line of defence." George visibly winced.
"I doubt it," She said, some of the familiar bite returning to her tone. "Seeing as he left a few weeks ago." Joe looked surprised.
"Well, I can't say I'm not pleased. I was talking to Deed about him not so long ago."
"Oh, he didn't tell me," Said George, wondering just what John had told her father.
"Yes, just after that ludicrous trial of the couple who very successfully bombed that prison you went to see." George slightly relaxed. There was every possibility that her father wasn't aware of what Neil had done to her.
"Well, you don't need to worry any more," She said. "He's gone, and he won't be coming back."
"What happened? Or is fatherly interest not permitted on this occasion." George smiled. He would show fatherly interest whether it was wanted or not. But she couldn't quite hide the slight tremor in her voice when she said,
"You don't need to know, Daddy. It's not important."
"By the look on your face, I would dare to disagree. Clearly it is important."
"Daddy, I mean it. This isn't up for discussion." Her voice had risen slightly, taking on the edge of panic that he hadn't heard in her since he'd tried to talk to her about why his one and only grandchild was living full time with Deed, not with her. Seeing that his perseverance would be fruitless, Joe abandoned this topic of conversation while they finished their meal and George stacked the plates in the dishwasher.
When they were seated in the lounge, George joined her father in an after dinner cigarette.
"At least your taking up this habit again means you won't prevent me from smoking in your house and banish me to the terrace," Said her father with a smile.
"I think I started again just to annoy Neil," Replied George dryly. "But then the addiction kicks in and letting go isn't so easy." Joe was inclined to think that she was talking about something far more serious than smoking, but as she didn't elaborate, he decided not to probe.
"Daddy, can I tell you something?" Asked George, feeling the urge to confess suddenly becoming unbearably strong.
"Do I want to hear it?" Asked Joe, knowing that for her to ask, it must be something serious.
"Probably not," George conceded, "But I expect you'll tell me how stupid I am, and maybe that's what I need to hear."
"I am as ever, intrigued," Replied Joe, raising his eyebrows.
"I've done something incredibly silly," George began. Realising by her tone who this must involve, Joe said,
"Are you seeing Deed again?" George almost laughed. Perhaps her father really did know her as well as he thought he did.
"No," She said, "At least, not exactly." This was her father after all, and she found it almost impossible to find the words necessary to explain exactly how John had come back in to the picture. Observing a hint of embarrassment in her face, Joe got up and walked to the sideboard, pouring himself a whisky and her a glass of Martini. With his back to her, he said,
"George, going to bed with one's ex, is never a good idea."
"I know," Said George miserably. "But I think I needed cheering up."
"And Deed will never say no to a beautiful woman," Added Joe, handing George her drink and sitting down on the sofa next to her. "But why now," Joe persisted, "why suddenly now, when as far as I'm aware, this hasn't happened since you were married to Deed." George turned her face slightly away from her father. Even now, even after all these years, she still found it extremely hard to talk to him about anything vaguely personal. Observing her difficulty, Joe turned her face so that she was forced to look at him.
"Now, you listen to me," He said quietly but firmly. "Your mother ought to be saying things like this to you, but as she isn't here, this parental duty falls to me. There isn't much I don't know about you and Deed, and what I don't know, I would suggest that I neither need nor want to know. So, talk."
"I don't know where to start," Said George, realising that her instinct to confess all to Daddy had after all been the right one.
"Start with Haughton, because I think I'm right in suggesting that this has something to do with him."
"You're determined to get this out of me, aren't you."
"Yes." Feeling thoroughly ashamed of what Neil had done to her, George turned her gaze away from him.
"Neil gave me a black eye," She said, mentally preparing herself for Joe's reaction.
"What!" The bark of fury made George inwardly retreat. "When did this happen?" Joe continued.
"You remember the last time Neil was there when you came over for dinner, about a month ago? Well, after you'd gone, we got in to an argument about why I couldn't achieve a not guilty verdict for Pilkinton and Atkins. You know me, Daddy, I always have to have the last word, and it appeared to be one insult too many."
"That's absolutely no excuse. If there's one thing a man never does it's to ever strike his woman." Briefly smiling at her father's insistence, George said,
Well, it seems he doesn't agree with you."
"What happened?"
"I drove away like a bat out of hell."
"Where did you go?" Asked Joe, thinking that he could work out the rest.
"I stayed with John."
"Why didn't you come here?"
"It's stupid, I know, but I was ashamed. I didn't want you to see me like that."
"What was Deed's reaction?"
"He let me stay there, and when Neil came to court the next day to try and talk to me, John held him up against the wall and threatened to see him doing time in the scrubs if he ever did anything like that to me again." Joe smiled broadly.
"Quite right too." Then a thought seemed to occur to him. "Was that when?..." He didn't seem able to voice the words, you slept with him.
"No, of course not," Replied George in defence of John's complete sensitivity on that night. "Not even John is that presumptuous. Daddy, don't be angry with John for this. It was me who went to him in the first place. He was good to me when I needed it, and that's all there is too it."
"But why the need to confess? It's something you've always avoided wherever possible." The dredging up of the real reason why her two evenings with John were getting to her so much, brought tears to George's eyes.
"I feel guilty," She said, unable to keep the tears at bay any longer. His daughter looked so desolate, so miserable, that Joe put aside his usual avoidance of displays of affection and put a strong, comforting arm round her shoulders.
"What's there to feel guilty about?" He asked softly, digging in his pocket for the clean handkerchief that perpetually resided there. "Deed is quite capable of refusing. Just because he never does, is hardly something you should feel guilty about."
"Not about him," Said George disgustedly, "I feel guilty about Jo, Jo Mills."
"Well, if we're talking about two people who certainly shouldn't be having a clandestine affair, it's Deed and Jo Mills. That is, after all, why she was brought up in front of the Professional Conduct Committee."
"Daddy, that's not the point and you know it. She and I have discovered some common ground lately, even managed to be civil to each other for more than five minutes. We've been working together on this case I'm forming against Prison Service area management. We seem to have put aside all the old points of friction, and then I go and do this to her." She took her father's handkerchief and wiped away her tears, loathing herself for revealing how weak she was to him.
"Mrs. Mills is another one who is quite capable of looking after herself," Put in Joe, not quite able to get his head round his daughter's new way of thinking.
"I know," Said George, "I just feel so wrong."
"Now listen," Said her father firmly. "Yes, maybe with hindsight, you shouldn't have slept with Deed again, but as long as you don't intend to repeat that event, you're only course of action is to forget it and move on. Jo Mills need never know about it. Deed is hardly likely to tell her, now is he."
"I know. I just wasn't expecting to feel like this."
"The only guilt I'm concerned about this evening," Said Joe, some of his old bluster returning, "Is that of Haughton for daring to raise a hand to my daughter. If this were two centuries ago, I'd have him clapped in irons." George smiled.
"There's nothing anyone can do about a man like him," She said resignedly, "He's gone from my life now, and he won't be coming back. Please, just forget it." Giving his daughter a look that clearly said, how can I, Joe got up to refill their drinks.
"So," He said, "Tell me more about this case against the prison service." As George filled him in, she still had a nagging doubt about what her father might do to Neil, and her guilt about Jo certainly wasn't in any danger of abating.
When the topic of the case had been exhausted, George went quiet for a moment.
"Daddy," She suddenly said, "Have I failed you?" He stared at her.
"What sort of a question is that. Of course not."
"Are you sure?" Asked George, desperately needing the kind of reassurance that only a parent can provide, and which far too many don't.
"George, I couldn't possibly have been more proud of you than I am," Said Joe, this being something he'd never been afraid of saying to his one and only child. "Yes, you've made the odd mistake in your life, but so do we all. The important thing is that you've come through them and moved on."
"There's one thing you're conveniently forgetting in all this," Said George, the alcohol she'd consumed making her able to voice this so hard to deal with of all her failures. "You can't exactly say I made a success of being a mother, can you." Wondering where this had suddenly come from, Joe fixed his daughter with a worried gaze.
"George, anything I may have said at the time, was buried and forgotten about long ago. No, I didn't and still can't understand why you felt the way you did when Charlie was born, but that didn't and hasn't and never will make me love you any less." George didn't know how to respond to this. "When you and Deed went your separate ways," He continued, "I remember having a very long argument with him about why Charlie was living with him and not you. At the time, I said that a child's place was with her mother, but Deed defended you on that point to the end. He couldn't have fought more for you that evening than if he'd been defending you in court. I still don't understand a lot of what he said during that battle of wills, but he managed to convince me that for you, it was the right thing to do."
"He never told me you'd talked to him about it," Said George, feeling an overwhelming gratitude for John's having defended her failure so vehemently.
"I'm not surprised," Replied Joe, remembering some of the harsh things he'd said to John, both on the subject of George's inability to care for her child, and of John's infidelity. A while later when George drove home, perhaps with too much alcohol inside her, she shed a few tears for the times she'd lost with John. He might have treated her badly in his continual conquest of other women, but he had stood by her when she'd failed to do the thing that she thought should come naturally to any mother. She would be eternally grateful to him for that. She just wished that she didn't still need him for the kind of thing he'd given her last week, for the way he could always make her feel safe, and, she realised, for the love she wished he still had for her.