Page 33 of The Love Game

This wasn’t really going to plan. Violet had hoped that Hortensia would be surprised but not displeased to see her, and that she’d perhaps fancy a chat over tea and biscuits.

Instead, Hortensia produced a bottle of gin and a cigarette in a long holder as Vi did as instructed and perched on the chair opposite her.

‘You’ve come because you wish to talk to your grandmother,’ the older woman said, pouring herself a ruinously large gin, raising disappointed eyebrows when Vi declined a glass.

‘Talk to my grandmother?’

Hortensia took a slow drag on her cigarette, then blew a plume of thin smoke in the air.

‘They’ve told you I have the sight, so you’re here to see if I can summon Monica.’

‘What?’ Vi sighed and shook her head. ‘That isn’t even a little bit true. I haven’t been talking about you, except to ask Barty who you were on the open day,’ she said.

‘That old goat,’ Hortensia huffed. ‘Always fancied himself as Hamlet, but he’s wooden as hell; he’d have given Long John Silver’s peg-leg a run for its money.’

She laughed under her breath at her own joke, then drained half of her glass and fixed her eyes on Violet.

‘Your grandmother is standing behind you.’

Vi jumped violently, twisting in her seat and finding nothing behind her but a Chihuahua snoozing on an overstuffed dark rose velvet chaise.

‘You’re hardly going to be able to see her, are you darling? Do try to keep up.’

Vi was beginning to realise that this wasn’t Hortensia’s first gin of the day.

‘And I’m not drunk,’ she said. Reaching for her box of cigarettes, she flipped it open and held it out, looking over Vi’s shoulder. ‘Ciggie, Monica?’

Hortensia pulled the same disappointed face as before as she snapped the lid back down, muttering under her breath.

On the one hand, it was powerfully alluring to think that her gran might be in the room, and a big chunk of Violet wanted to believe it and ask a million questions.

But on the other, Hortensia was slurring her words slightly and had her cardigan on inside out, so it was hard to cling onto the idea of her gran’s ghost paying them a timely visit.

‘Are you sure?’ she said, adding a little smile to soften the doubt.

‘Unless I’m seeing double,’ Hortensia said.

That didn’t seem entirely unlikely.

‘She’s worried about you.’ Hortensia screwed her face up as she stared hard behind Vi and fiddled with her hearing aid, making it whistle. ‘Wants you to choose a different path.’

Vi sighed. It was all so generic, and Hortensia had just drained her gin and refilled her glass.

‘A different path? What does that mean?’

‘Who knows,’ Hortensia said, flicking her ash into a plant pot. ‘She’s telling you to check your diary. Always was too enigmatic for her own good, that girl.’

And with that, Hortensia went face down on the table, out for the count.

Vi sighed, and sat listening to the steady tick of the mantle clock. She knew it was fanciful to think her gran had ever been there, but a small part of her brain believed that she was. Hortensia had mentioned a diary after all, even if the context was wrong.

‘Gran?’ she said. ‘Are you here?’

Quite what she’d have done if she’d received any kind of positive sign, she didn’t know. She didn’t of course.

Feeling foolish, she put Hortensia’s cigarette out, moved the tumbler of gin out of harm’s way, and let herself out of the house.

Violet was in danger of turning into a prune.

She’d spent every evening that week wallowing in the bath, music loud on her phone so she couldn’t hear any comings and goings out on the landing.

She knew enough to know that Ursula was still staying with Cal; she’d glimpsed her blonde head coming and going on the street below.

Cal had been working off site and she’d ignored his daily texts, until this morning.

He’d asked if they could talk tonight, and she’d finally replied with a terse I’d really rather not in the hope of putting an end to things.

Maybe it was because of Monica’s diary, but she was trying to learn from her grandmother’s mistakes and not let her heart be ruled by a married man.

It had been over a week since they’d hooked up but tonight at least, she had plans.

It was Friday night and she had a date; a dinner date with a rather distinguished man in his eighties.

She’d bumped into Barty downstairs that morning and invited him up for a bite to eat, hoping to take her mind off Cal by hearing more about her grandparents from someone who actually knew them at the time.

She’d made shepherd’s pie, splashed out on a decent bottle of red, and she painted a welcoming smile on her face for him when he knocked the door right on time.

It wasn’t Barty.

‘Cal,’ she said, her heart starting to race. ‘I thought you were someone else.’

His eyes moved over her, taking in the slick of mascara and lip-gloss, her skinny jeans and pretty pink and black blouse. ‘Did you? Who?’

Vi looked at the floor, suddenly unwilling to confess that her effort was just for Barty. ‘Does it matter?’

He sighed, then nodded and looked away towards the beach outside the landing window. ‘Can we talk?’

She was glad of a genuine reason to say no. ‘I can’t, Cal.’

‘Can’t or won’t?’

‘Does it even matter?’ she said, needled, keeping her voice low in case Ursula was in his apartment, already hating the extra layer of illicitness it added to things. ‘Your wife came home, Cal. It changes things.’

‘This isn’t her home, she never lived here,’ he said. ‘Please, Violet,’ he said. ‘Talk to me.’

She shook her head. ‘I’ve got nothing to say to you.’

‘Well I’ve got plenty to say to you,’ he said, quiet and urgent, glancing over his shoulder like any self-respecting unfaithful husband might.

‘I don’t want to hear it, Cal,’ she said, making a point of glancing at her watch.

He stared at her, breathing a little too fast.

‘Fine. Don’t listen to me,’ he said, then he stepped in to her and kissed her hard on the mouth, making her gasp, making her ache.

Relief and frustration rushed through Violet’s bloodstream undammed.

Relief at the taste of him, frustration because he was turning her into someone she didn’t want to be.

‘I won’t be the other woman,’ she said, choked up, wanting him with every traitorous bone in her body as he backed her against the door, his hand in her hair, his mouth agonisingly gentle now as he kissed her slow and deep.

‘I wouldn’t let you be,’ he whispered. ‘Don’t go out with someone else tonight.’

It was thrillingly possessive. ‘You have no right to ask that of me,’ she said softly.

He held her face between his hands, looking into her eyes even as they heard footsteps heading up towards the top floor.

‘Don’t you think I know that?’

They stared silently at each other for a few long seconds before he stepped back, pulling himself together, giving her a moment to do the same before her date arrived. Barty chose that moment to appear at the top of the stairs, clutching his chest and rolling his eyes.

‘I hope you have something suitably strong in there to revive me, young woman, those stairs are enough to kill a lesser man.’ He leaned on the bannister. ‘If I didn’t do Zumba twice a week I’d be a goner.’

Cal looked at Barty and then back at Violet. ‘I’ll leave you to it,’ he said, something like relief in his eyes. ‘Enjoy your evening.’

Vi watched him go, dully aware that she’d never felt more akin to her gran.

‘Someone looks as if he’s swallowed a hornet,’ Barty said, following her through into the apartment. And then he paused, and laid his hand on his heart as he looked around, taking it all in.

‘Just as I recall it.’ He shook his head, a nostalgic beam on his face. ‘You haven’t changed a thing?’

Vi shook her head. ‘Not yet at least. It still feels more like theirs than mine.’

‘These things take time,’ Barty said, patting the dining table like an old friend as he walked into the living room. ‘She had fabulous taste, didn’t she.’

‘My grandmother?’ Vi said, pulling a chair out for him and pouring him a glass of red.

Barty didn’t answer straight away. His eyes had settled on the collection of framed photos on the sideboard, some with their colour faded, some black and white.

‘You’re so like her, it’s uncanny.’

Vi placed the shepherd’s pie down in the middle of the table. ‘Will you tell me about her?’ she asked, ladling food onto the plates. When Barty’s face fell, she added, ‘Please, I don’t have anyone else to ask.’

She sat down and added roasted veg to their plates, picking up her cutlery.

‘She was an enigma,’ Barty said, looking at the photographs again. ‘Full of energy and movement, like a Picasso brought to life.’

Vi considered his words, startled by the description. ‘That’s a lovely thing to say,’ she said.

Barty lowered his gaze to his food as he loaded his fork. ‘Your grandfather was chalk to her cheese. Quiet, stoic.’ He ate slowly, thinking. ‘What she needed probably, an anchor to stop her from floating away.’

‘Were they very in love, do you think?’ Vi said, desperate to hear a good account of her grandmother.

‘Oh, I’m sure they must have been,’ Barty said, drinking his wine. ‘They had your mother, after all.’

Vi nodded. ‘She won’t come back here,’ she said. ‘My mum, I mean. She doesn’t want anything to do with this place.’

Barty frowned. ‘She was just a child when it happened,’ he said. ‘Too young to lose a mother.’

‘Do you know what happened to her?’ Vi said. She was finding Monica’s diary more and more stressful to read, because in the back of her mind she was aware that every entry drew her nearer towards the fateful night of Monica’s death.

Barty didn’t reply, just laid his cutlery down and swallowed more wine.

‘I mean, I know she fell from the pier and died on her birthday, but I don’t know any more than that. How it happened, or why.’

For the first time since she’d known him, Barty looked his age.

‘It’s not my place,’ he said, his hand shaking slightly.

‘Please Barty. There’s no one else I can ask,’ Vi said. ‘I found her diary,’ she added, almost a whisper. ‘I think she might have been having an affair.’

She reached for her wine, feeling horribly disloyal talking about Monica like that, especially in her own living room.

‘Child, don’t ask me any more,’ Barty said. ‘She isn’t here to speak for herself. Some things are best left in the past.’

Violet nodded, almost relieved that Barty was old-school enough to preserve her grandmother’s privacy.

She craved details of Monica because she felt such a deep affinity with her on so many levels, but in another way she felt as if she was poking a stick in a hornets’ nest. She was damn lucky to have inherited this place and the pier, she should just count her blessings and either settle down here or sell up and move on.

But still something needled away at her, even if she couldn’t quite put her finger on what it was.

‘Am I like her?’

She wanted him to say yes, and she wanted him to say no. There seemed an inevitable affinity between Monica and Violet across the decades, and sometimes in the middle of the night she was scared by the knowledge that Monica hadn’t survived Swallow Beach.

‘In some ways, yes. In features, of course. And you have her charisma too.’

Vi half laughed. ‘No one has ever called me charismatic in my whole life, Barty.’

He shrugged. ‘Charisma isn’t always about being the one who shouts the loudest or looks the slickest, you know,’ he said. ‘She had a presence, like a principal ballet dancer.’

Barty certainly painted a picture of an interesting woman.

‘I wish I’d known her.’

‘I’m sure she would have adored you,’ he said. ‘Don’t judge her harshly for her choices, Violet. Your grandpa was a fine man, but if I recall correctly, a rather absent one for much of the time.’

Vi nodded, because his words echoed Monica’s diary. ‘Oh, I know,’ she said. ‘I’m not, really I’m not. It’s great to hear your memories of her though, because she feels like such a big presence in my life now, which is weird when I didn’t even know anything beyond her name before I came here.’

‘You were brave to come here,’ he said. ‘It’s what she would have done too.’

Vi smiled softly. ‘Everyone at home thought I was crazy. Still do.’

‘Maybe you are a little crazy,’ he said, raising his glass to hers. ‘But far better to be crazy than dull, darling. Your gran had a truly adventurous spirit.’

A sombre question hovered on Vi’s lips. ‘Did you go to her funeral?’

It felt important to know that Monica had a fitting farewell, hopefully a celebration of colour and vitality.

Barty’s face fell. ‘I didn’t, my darling,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t. There wasn’t one.’

Violet sat for a long time after Barty left, a mug of coffee going cold in her hands. She was in her bedroom, curled into the armchair in the bay window as she so often was when she couldn’t sleep, a blanket over her legs.

He’d elaborated a little more about the funeral, or lack of it.

As far as he could remember, there had been an inquest after Monica’s death, and although the people of Swallow Beach expected a funeral to follow, Henry packed up his belongings and he and his daughter had left town.

Everyone had assumed that a funeral was to be held elsewhere, and of course Monica’s many friends had asked to be kept informed, only to receive a very short missive via Henry’s solicitor in the form of a notice attached to the pier gates.

Barty couldn’t remember the exact words, but it was something to the effect of Monica’s funeral having taken place, a small private affair held in Shrewsbury.

How odd. Probably Grandpa Henry just couldn’t face the idea of a big funeral, but it was such a shame that Monica hadn’t been properly mourned and honoured.

Was it evidence that her grandfather had uncovered Monica’s affair?

Had they argued on the day she died? The whole business felt murky and dark, as unfathomable as the pitch-dark sea out in the bay.

Closing her eyes, she made a silent promise to Monica. I’ll keep your secrets, Gran, and I’ll make you proud.