A Little Love (9 page)

‘They still made me stand at the front!’

‘They did that.’ Milly’s eyes twinkled. ‘Of course you can borrow some matches. They’re in the kitchen drawer, but please be careful.’

‘I will. I went out today and bought three beautiful new Jo Malone candles and I’m going to have them burning when William arrives. And I’ve cooked dinner—’

‘You’ve cooked dinner? Well saints be praised!’ Her aunt clasped her hands in mock prayer and tried not to sound too shocked.

‘Well, you know what I mean. I’ve heated stuff up. Asparagus tarts! Guy gave them to me, they were on the turn.’

‘Ah, how lovely. I’m sure that’s exactly what Billy-boy wants after a hard day’s soldiering – to come home to three fabulous smelly candles and heated-up asparagus bloody tart that’s on the turn.’

‘He does!’ Bobby bit the inside of her cheek again.

‘Are you sure? Because if you are in any doubt, I’ve had Fortnum’s deliver today, so there’s lovely pâté, cheese, crackers, chutney and any amount of Parma ham – you can always help yourself, that’s if you need it. Or better still, tell Billy-boy and he can come and help himself, just in case he isn’t partial to a tart the size of a postage stamp.’

‘He doesn’t mind what he gets. As long as he’s with me he’s happy.’

Milly laughed. ‘Oh ain’t love grand! It must be lovely when all you need is the whiff of a scented candle and each other. In my day, a working man would expect a pint of stout and a big bowl of shepherd’s pie or a nice fat pork chop with two veg when he got in.’

‘Urgh, well in that case I’m glad it’s not your day! I’m far too busy to stand cooking all day. He’ll have to make do with me heating things up unless he wants to cook for himself; and if he does, I shan’t stop him.’

Milly shook her head. It amazed her that Bobby was too busy despite not having a job. Her diary was full, a fatiguing whirl of get-togethers and vital shopping excursions, punctuated by hairdresser’s appointments and trips to the brow and nail bar. She was one of the blessed – so beautiful that any number of men would want her, regardless of her homemaking skills. It genuinely had been very different in
her
day, not that she had really had her day. No man had ever wanted her, not in that way, and she understood why. And for her part, she was too familiar with the habits of men to forgive even the smallest flaws. She viewed them as a species, a collective of silver-tongued chancers; she didn’t distinguish them as individuals any more.

‘Anyway, this time next year we’ll be married and it’ll be too late for him to mind about me being a crap cook. I’ll have him trapped! But luckily he loves me and so it won’t matter. In fact I might stop shaving my legs and wearing make-up, really let myself go!’ Bobby squealed delightedly at the prospect and flounced from the room. She had it all figured out.

Milly returned to her crossword, tapping her pen against her front teeth.

A minute later Bobby popped her head round the door, shaking a box of matches. ‘Got them! Thanks, Mills. I’m off out now, going to pick William up from work.’

Milly didn’t look up but raised her pen in a wave as she studied seven across.

Pru arrived home just over an hour and a half later.

‘Gosh, Mills, what a day! This is the first chance I’ve had to draw breath.’ She kicked off her shoes and flexed her ankles. ‘Ooh, it’s lovely to sit down. I think I’ll have a hot bath and an early night. I haven’t stopped.’ She rubbed at her eyes.

‘Tell me about it! The shop has been crazy. We had a rush on macaroons and cupcakes from a coachload of Japanese tourists. You know how they always love the packaging so much – they were taking photos left, right and centre. Guy said he’d been snapped so often, he felt like Kate Moss!’

Pru laughed. ‘He’d have loved every minute.’

‘Yes, I think he did. We were out of fresh-baked by three o’clock. We had to fill the cabinet with truffles and cookies from the freezer – once we’d given them a quick once-over in the microwave! But I think we got away with it.’

‘We’re just too darn good, Mills.’

‘That we are.’ Milly yawned and stretched. ‘Bobby was in earlier, wrecking the joint as usual and nicking our matches. I think she’s got a bit of a night planned with Billy-boy.’ She winked at her cousin.

‘Lucky Billy-boy. I had a result as well: I’ve had the nod on the big Condé Nast summer ball.’ Pru couldn’t wait to start working on this – a towering croque-en-bouche centrepiece covered in a cobweb of spun sugar, with mini lemon tarts and hand-piped brandy snaps for pudding. ‘I’m getting the colour scheme as soon as they have it and we can add a garnish or something beautiful to blend. I’m thinking mint leaves if it’s greens or pansy leaves for purple, that kind of thing. Or caramel strands if it’s gold, of course!’

‘It’ll be stunning. Better get Guy to start the sketches.’

‘Yes, good idea—’

They were interrupted by the beep of Pru’s phone.

‘No need to ask who that’s from – you look like a bloody Cheshire cat,’ Milly sniped.

Pru ignored her cousin, but she knew how irritating it could be. They’d had plenty of it with Bobby over the last year; she whooped and hollered every time her phone gave off its annoying little ping, then followed that by jumping up and down on the spot. And yet now Pru too cuddled her phone and read and reread the text:
Just had lonely cup of tea, wish you were here.
Who would have guessed that those ten words, delivered in such a sterile fashion, could bring such joy?

Pru was about to reply when the front door buzzed.

‘That girl is a nightmare! She’s forgotten her bloody key again. I told her not to set fire to anything, but I forgot to remind her to take a front door key. It’s like having a child around, isn’t it?’

‘I’ll go.’ Pru stood and straightened her blouse. ‘I’m not going to just buzz it open, in case it isn’t her. We could have half of Curzon Street wandering up.’

‘Yes, Pru, I’m sure that’s why you want to go, and not because you are hoping it’s a certain balding politician with an hour to kill.’

‘He is not balding, jheesh!’ Pru grinned as she fixed her hair and descended the stairs.

It was a few minutes later that the front door of the flat slammed. Milly jumped.

‘For Gawd’s sake, Bobby, that’s the second time tonight you’ve done that!’ she shouted from her chair.

‘Bob?’ she shouted again towards the hallway.

There was no response. That was odd: Bobby was always a second away from issuing a witty retort or bouncing into the room like Tigger on speed.

‘Bobby, is that you, love? Pru?’ Milly leant forward, craning her neck.

Slowly Pru entered the sitting room. She had the wobbly gait of a drunk and leant against the doorframe for support. Her cheeks had lost their peachy blush of ten minutes ago. Her eyes were narrowed and she looked old, suddenly.

What on earth?
Milly stood and walked towards her. ‘Are you okay, love? What’s the matter? Is it Christopher?’

Pru looked at her cousin and then over her shoulder. Milly followed her gaze and it was then that she saw the policeman standing in the hallway, hovering outside the sitting room door, unsure whether to walk in or wait for an invitation. He was blond, young and on edge, with his hat lodged awkwardly under his arm.

Pru indicated the young PC with her hand. ‘I… just… they…’ She couldn’t get the words out.

Milly gripped Pru’s shoulder and pushed the stray locks of hair from her cousin’s forehead. ‘Take your time. What’s happened?’

Pru took several deep breaths, like an athlete preparing to perform. Her voice, when she finally spoke, was little more than a whisper. ‘Hospital. We need to get to the hospital. It’s William and Bobby. They’ve had an accident in the car. They’re in St Thomas’s.’

‘What? Oh my God!’ Milly gasped and clutched at the collar of her tunic. ‘Are they all right? What happened?’

‘The police have got a car downstairs, they said they’d drop us off.’

Milly couldn’t take her eyes from her cousin. ‘What did they say, are they hurt?’

Pru shook her head. ‘I don’t know. They were in the car and they’ve hit something—’

‘Yes, that’s right, Bobby went to pick him up.’

‘William was driving, but I don’t know anything else.’ Pru’s eyes brimmed with tears and her legs swayed.

Milly grabbed her handbag from the side table and addressed the young PC. ‘Is she okay? Do you know if she’s hurt?’

‘I don’t have any other details, I’m sorry.’

Milly inhaled sharply and assumed control. ‘Right, well, let’s not panic until we know what’s what. But let’s get straight to the hospital and we’ll take it from there.’ She smiled thinly and glanced out of the window, drawn by the blue light that swept around the sitting room, bouncing off the walls, filling the space with a menacing glare. The police car was parked directly below them, half on the pavement.

At that time of night traffic was light and they arrived at St Thomas’s in fifteen minutes. Milly put her arm round Pru’s shoulders as they hurried through the automatic double doors and under the large red canopy into Accident and Emergency.

Reception was busy, full of anxious relatives, the walking wounded and loud, shouty drunks. It was horribly tense. Pru and Milly half walked, half jogged to the desk and waited their turn behind an elderly man who had forgotten his postcode. The policeman stood with them. Finally they got to the front and the young PC explained who they were looking for.

‘Bear with me, one second.’ The receptionist tapped into a keyboard and ran her eyes down the screen in front of her. Her smile faltered and something in the way her eyebrows twitched made Pru’s heart thump.

‘Please, take a seat.’ The woman gestured to a bank of chairs. ‘Someone will be right along to assist you.’

The policeman disappeared into the bowels of the hospital and Pru watched as Milly chewed and ripped at her fingernails, something she had done since she was five years old and no amount of chastising or bitter aloes could cure. Neither woman spoke.

It was some minutes later that a bedraggled doctor appeared, in his early thirties and wearing green Converse All Stars under his blue scrubs. He was holding a clipboard and he looked nervous.

‘Miss Plum?’

‘Yes.’ Both women stepped forward.

‘I’m Dr Carmichael. Would you like to come with me?’ He turned and walked quickly without waiting for a reply. The two women had to trot to keep up.

Eventually Dr Carmichael stopped in front of a small room, opened the door and flicked on the overhead strip light. It was a typical waiting room: sterile, bare and depressing. There were two red vinyl couches in an L shape along the back and side wall and the walls themselves had been painted with pale grey gloss paint. The place seemed to radiate misery.

Pru and Milly looked at each other and then the doctor; they had expected to be taken to Bobby.

‘Please sit down.’ The doctor gestured to the far sofa.

Pru turned to face him. ‘Actually, I don’t want to be rude, but I’d much rather go and see my niece first, if that’s okay. I’m happy to chat or fill out forms or anything later on…’ She was babbling now, determined not to listen to what her gut was trying to tell her. The doctor, the clipboard, the grey room. ‘But I’d rather see her first, if it’s not too much trouble.’

He gave a brief nod. ‘I understand, but I think you should sit down, Miss Plum, so that we can have a proper chat.’

The two women sat close together, heads tilted, and stared at him with identical expressions of concern. Dr Carmichael put the clipboard on the sofa next to him and joined his hands before planting his elbows on his knees and placing his fists under his chin. He took a deep breath.

Milly looked at the set of his jaw and noted the nervous twitch of his eye.
Oh God! Oh dear God, no!

‘I have been on duty here all evening and at about seven o’clock your niece and her fiancé were brought in by ambulance. As you know, they had an accident in the car, which your niece’s fiancé was driving; apparently they went into the back of a lorry. No one else was hurt. They were treated separately by two different teams.’

Pru glanced at her watch – it was half past ten – and stared fixedly at the doctor. It was as if he was reading from a script; like he was in an episode of
Holby City
.

‘I was one of the first to see Roberta when she arrived and she was seen immediately. She also received some treatment in the ambulance. She wasn’t conscious. There were significant crush injuries to her chest and her spine was damaged. She was very badly hurt.’

Pru watched the man’s mouth open and close. His words reached her brain with a split-second delay, like a badly lip-synced song.
She was very badly hurt.

The doctor spoke slowly and deliberately. ‘We took her straight into resuscitation and we tried very hard. A team of us did everything that we thought might make a difference, but it didn’t.’

Milly reached out and gathered her cousin’s hand into her own.

Pru struggled to focus. ‘So is she still hurt? Do you need to give her an operation or something?’
I’ll move her into the spare room in our flat while she recuperates, get some of her favourite things in, nice drinks and plenty of magazines.
She leant forward. ‘I’d like you to do whatever it takes. I can pay for her to see a specialist, if that would make a difference?’

Dr Carmichael shook his head. ‘No, it wouldn’t make any difference. I am very sorry, Miss Plum, but Roberta did not regain consciousness. She was pronounced dead at nine p.m. and William shortly afterwards. She wasn’t in any pain; she never woke up. I am very sorry.’

Pru sat in silence, stunned and still. Milly’s face crumpled as she watched her, waiting for a reaction.

Dr Carmichael looked at the floor, still awkward at having to be the bearer of this sort of news, despite having done it many times in his career.

‘Miss Plum?’

‘Yes?’ Pru whispered.

‘Do you understand what I have just told you?’ He wondered if her silence, her lack of response, might equal inattention, but he was wrong. She had heard every word.