Page 70 of These Old Lies

Betty snorted in knowing laughter, a peculiar moment of shared intimacy.

Betty reached for the doorknob. “Supper’s on the stove, Charlie will just need to turn on the gas. Don’t let him burn the pot.”

Ned closed the door behind her and looked up at the hideous grandfather clock long ago relegated to the hall.

Almost as soon as Ned had understood the implications of being attracted only to men, he had decided that he would never deceive a wife. Equally, he had no intention of being alone or burying his desires. A family would never be in the cards him, and instead he would live a life of passionate, secret affairs without the constraints of a family.

A life that many of his peers who were attracted to women would envy.

Yet, his lover’s wife had just wished him a nice evening, told him to put the supper on, all the while with the chatter of children coming from the living room.

The clock’s large hand dramatically shuddered forward another minute.

Ned had somehow stumbled into his own personal No Man’s Land, with no idea where the mines were buried.

???

Several nights later, Ned found himself reading in his den with the two Villiers children. Ellie was sprawled out over his sofa with some cheap comics, while her brother was hunched over some papers at the corner desk. Ned was sitting in his favourite armchair, reading the boring but unremarkable Conan Doyle.

His focus on Sherlock and Watson wasn’t improved by the constant fidgeting from Frank. The boy somehow managed to be half doubled over the desk and still taking up half the room with his overstretched legs. One knee bobbed up and down, while his left hand gripped his hair. From this angle, it was like watching Charlie from twenty years ago—the same nervous energy and vibrating frustration.

After a particularly loud sigh from Frank, Ned glanced over to Ellie, who rolled her eyes and sighed in the disgusted way only truly mastered by a child of twelve.

“Can’t you be quiet?” Frank snapped at his sister.

Ellie didn’t bother to look up from her comics. “It's not my fault you don’t understand maths.”

Frank was working on maths problems? Nowthatwas unexpected.

When the Villierses moved in with Ned, there had been much anxiety to find Ellie a place at a Kensington school, but no mention had been made of Frank’s education. He’d moved from working in Villiers Automotive to being a shopboy in his uncle’s butcher shop.

Yet here he was, working on maths problems in the evening. Not the most eccentric hobby Ned had ever come across, but not a typical way for a sixteen-year-old boy to spend his evenings.

Ned flipped the page in his book. Should he enquire about what Frank was up to? It was hardly his business, yet Ned had an honest curiosity about the boy. Even if he hadn't been Charlie’s son, Ned had seen enough of Frank to know he had a quick wit and a good heart.

In the end, Ned determined that it would only be polite to ask, and if the boy didn’t want Ned to know, they would leave it at that.

“I don’t think I would have the courage to tackle mathematics after a day of work. What’s got you working on these problems?” Ned asked, hoping his tone was friendly.

Frank didn’t look up from his papers. “I’m not an idiot.”

“You most certainly are not,” Ned answered crisply. “The books you keep borrowing from my library are proof enough of that.”

“Frank’s studying for the Higher School Certificate,” Ellie interjected from where she was now dangling her head off the sofa, legs swinging back and forth in the air against the back.

Ned felt a burst of pride. Never let it be said that Charlie’s son lacked ambition.

Meeting Frank’s eyes he said seriously, “Good for you.”

Frank grumbled something back under his breath that Ned hadn’t been able to fully make out, but guessed included phrases that the boy shouldn’t be saying to his little sister.

“I might write the exam. They aren’t even running them during the war. And a lot of what they ask is useless. What good is algebra ever going to do me?”

Ned closed his book and put it on the table beside his chair. “I said that about my German classes, you know.”

“And?” Frank twisted in his chair so that he was facing Ned.

“Saved my life more times than I could count. So you never know. You might have an algebra emergency one day.” Ned paused.