Page 49

Coralie opened the door, but it was Adam he greeted first, lunging forward with a handshake so firm it made his sinewy bicep perceptibly bulge.

Over his checked shirt he was wearing what she always thought of as a right-wing jumper (lambswool, with a quarter zip and a ribbed collar; Tory Tom often wore one).

Instead of his old R. M. Williams boots, he’d actioned a smart traveling sneaker in a soft brown leather.

(“Your father has no problem spending money on himself,” she remembered her mother once telling her.)

“Bloody awful,” he was saying as they embraced.

“Oh, the flight?”

“Coughing and spluttering up and down the plane. If I didn’t have Covid before, I do now. Gosh, London’s changed, hasn’t it?”

“Oh?” This was almost certainly a comment about racial and ethnic diversity. “Well, how long has it been since—”

“Hello,” Roger cut her off. “And who’s this?”

Florence, flushed and giggling, was peeping through the open door to the sitting room.

“This is Florence, isn’t it, Flo-Flo?” Adam held out his arm. “Come and say hello to Grandad.”

“Florence. Well, aren’t you a looker? What a stunner. Where did that come from?” He scrutinized Coralie and Adam, searching for the source of her beauty and evidently not finding it.

Florence faltered, unable to match up what sounded like a compliment with Roger’s accusatorial tone. Where was Max? “Minnie!” Coralie called.

Roger stared at her. “Who’s Minnie?”

“Max? Maxi? It’s a nickname.”

“Why?”

“Oh, because—”

“Max! There you are, mate!” Max was bouncing in the hall on his tiptoes. “Hold on.” Her father stared at him. “Are you a boy or a girl? He’s a boy, isn’t he?”

“He’s a boy!” Florence said.

“I just thought, because of the hair…”

Coralie had never had her son’s now-shoulder-length hair cut, first because he was a pandemic baby, and then because he looked so pretty.

While Flo’s had matured into a light brown, Maxi’s hair was still shiny and gold.

She had clipped it back at breakfast so he could eat his Weetabix. “Oh, no, it’s just that—”

Roger snatched the sparkly clip from Maxi’s hair, pulling several flaxen strands out along with it. “We’ll get rid of that, at least!”

Max stared at him, astonished.

“Well, Roger!” Adam stepped into the aghast silence. “How are you feeling about beverages? Tea, coffee? We’ve got time for a quick one before we get these guys off to school.”

“You don’t need school, do you? Stay home with Grandad.”

“Oh!” Coralie laughed. She’d just had the children home (and in Lanzarote) for three weeks over Easter. Before that they’d been home for two years . “He’s joking! Grandad’s joking. Flo, did you know Grandad has a dog? A tiny dog, and do you know her name? Princess!”

“Not anymore,” her father said. “Jenny kept her.”

“Sorry to hear about that,” Adam said.

“Jenny? Her loss. I’ll take a coffee, since you’re offering. And where’s that other big girl’s blouse?” Roger barked as he strode to the kitchen.

“Oh,” Coralie said faintly. “Daniel, you mean. He’s hoping to cook dinner for us tonight.”

“Tonight?” Her father pulled back the chair at the head of the table. “I won’t be around. No, I’ll make it to four, five, maybe. And then I’ll be in bed. Won’t I?” he growled at Florence, who looked flattered to be addressed, although unsure how to respond.

“Grandad,” Flo began.

“What’s all this?” He gestured at the array of pleasingly realistic Schleich animals that accompanied Maxi everywhere and were presently clustered around his toast plate.

“Tiger!” Maxi said. “Lion, rar !”

Roger picked up the largest of the animals. “And here is a heffalump.”

“Heffalump?” Flo repeated, confused. “No, no, Grandad, it’s an elephant.”

“Enna-phant,” Max said charmingly. “Fuh-fah!” His trunk sound.

“Oh dear,” Roger said. “You don’t know what a heffalump is. Well, in that case, children, I can’t help you!”

She had forgotten this aspect of her father’s character, a fantastical strain barely compatible with his self-presentation as a fact-based, strategic military man.

“I think a heffalump is from a famous book from the olden days,” she explained. “Called Winnie-the-Pooh .”

“Winnie-the- Pooh ?” Flo repeated, astonished.

“He wasn’t a poo,” Coralie said. “He was a bear.”

“A poo who was a bear?”

“That’s enough of the toilet talk,” Roger said with a frown. “It’s not polite, is it?”

Coralie stood up. “I’m just going to…” She trailed off. “We have to leave in a couple of minutes for nursery. Are you going to come, Dad?”

Florence was stunned. “Dad!”

“Yes, Roger— Grandad —is my dad.”

Florence shook her head in disbelief. Coralie couldn’t quite believe it either.

“I’ll come,” Roger said. “How far’s the drive?”

“It’s just a walk through the park.”

“A walk through the park,” he mused. “ Okay. What about you, Adam? You’ll be too busy, I suppose?” He was genial, comradely—one tireless world leader to another.

“I often do the school run.” Adam caught Coralie’s eye and carefully added, “In the mornings.”

“But he has meetings this morning,” Coralie said. “Don’t you?”

“I do,” he said. “Sadly.”

“I read your election book,” Roger said. “The Boris one. Now, he’s a real character, Boris. Someone I’d have a beer with.”

“He’s in trouble at the moment for doing exactly that,” Adam said. “During the pandemic. You’ve read about Partygate?”

“Pfft,” Roger said. “Britain won’t know what it’s got till it’s gone.”

“We actually have to get moving,” Coralie apologized. “Maxi’s drop-off is before Florence’s.”

But by the time they managed to farewell Adam and leave the house, it was already twenty to nine. They would have to do Florence first, and then ring the bell at Montessori and cringingly insinuate Max into class. Miss Sarah didn’t like the children to miss their handshake.

Out in the street, Florence trotted next to Roger. “What’s your favorite subject at school?” he quizzed. “Physics? Geography? Advanced mathematics?”

“I like reading? And—” ( And gymnastics , Coralie knew she was going to say. Flo adored Marley, her gymnastics teacher.)

But her father didn’t let her finish. “Reading, eh! That sounds familiar. Your mother loved sitting on her backside with a book.” As Coralie digested this, Maxi gave a little shriek from the buggy. Roger wheeled around as if he’d been punched. “What’s your problem?”

They had reached the wall Max liked to walk along, holding hands with Coralie, and then getting what she called a “tall kiss” at the end, because the wall made him the same height as she was. “Sorry, Maxi, there isn’t time,” she said.

He beat his legs and feet against the buggy and squirmed against the straps. Viewing her beloved boy’s behavior through the judgmental eyes of her father, she was shocked to find herself wanting to shake him—not her father, Max. She checked the time on her phone. “Okay, a quick one.”

Maxi’s tearstained face was all smiles as he leaped up. “He’s a very good balancer,” she narrated as he stepped nimbly along the wall with just the lightest touch of her hand.

“He’s got you wrapped around his little finger,” Roger said.

It was time for Maxi’s tall kiss. Coralie tried to get away with a quick one, kissing his soft cheek before wrapping her arms around him and imperiling her pelvic floor as she hauled him bodily back into the buggy.

He started wailing again; she buckled him in, her flesh crawling from embarrassment as everyone on the street was left in no doubt about her failings as a mother.

She dug out the emergency squeezy tube of puréed fruit in her bag, clicked the lid off, and gave it to him.

“That’s right,” Roger told Max. “Get some pure sugar into you. You bloody crybaby.” He said it wittily, roguishly, almost like an inside joke.

“Grandad…” Flo tried again.

Roger strode off in the lead despite not knowing the way.

She lost him for a bit in the crowds doing drop-off.

Only children in Year 3 and above were allowed to run into the school building under their own steam.

All the younger years lined up in the playground, then processed in with their teacher, parents grouped around to wave farewell.

As usual, a significant number of children were crying, causing delays.

It was hard to keep her buggy out of the way and to navigate around the buggies of other people.

Often she didn’t get out of there until ten past nine, and so it was that day.

Her father was waiting outside the gate, pacing, a haunted look on his face.

“Very hectic,” she empathized.

“Battle of Basra in there. Where’s my AS-90 self-propelled howitzer? Joking! Of course, I didn’t see action myself in Iraq. I was merely a…” (he pronounced the words with relish) “ desk jockey . Good grief, now where are we going?”

It would be a very painful visit if he was bored after only an hour. “Maxi’s nursery, through the park and behind the market.”

“This is what you do, is it? Walk around all day with a pram? Yummy mummy?”

“Oh!” Coralie said. “I suppose—”

“Hi, Coralie,” one of a pair of mums called.

They were in their activewear. Coralie would have given a limb to be striding out for a walk with a friend, unencumbered.

Lydia dropped Nancy at nursery and went to work.

Beauty went to a different school nearby but was on the waiting list to transfer.

Alice, Lydia, Adam, my children, home. She drew strength from the thought of them.

Roger might be her father, but she wasn’t a child. Things were different now.

“So, tell me,” she said. These types of pauses were dangerous around her father; he invariably hijacked them. “What are your plans while you’re here?” she quickly finished.

“See my beautiful grandchildren. Churchill’s bunker. Sherlock Holmes Museum. New umbrella from the umbrella shop. British Museum.”

“What date is your return flight?”

He gave a wolfish, sinister smile. “Flexible.”

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