Page 129 of Wife After Wife

Paranoia was always lurking. A knock on the door or a ring of the phone could freeze him to the spot, convinced that whoever was there was not of this world.

He had blinding headaches, which handfuls of painkillers onlyreduced to a dull throb. Plain brown envelopes full of pills would be pushed through the letterbox every few days. Thank heavens for text messaging, though with his shaking fingers, tapping out a request to Andre’s contact was a challenge.

“Come and stay with us. I’m worried about you,” said Charles. “Reallyworried. Have you looked in the mirror lately?”

Last time he’d done so, he’d seen Ana standing behind him. He hadn’t used a mirror since.

“No.”

“Darling, you look like a ghost,” said Megan. “Please, let us look after you. I know you want to be alone, but you’ve got to face the world sometime. We can help you.”

Harry laid his head on his arms and started to cry. “Why her, Megan? I can’t understand. Janette was such a good person. I should have made her go to hospital earlier. I should have—”

“Don’t, Harry,” said Charles. “It was a terrible thing, but it was no one’s fault.”

Megan began to cry too. “I don’t understand either. The bad things that keep happening to your wives. It’s like a curse. Why is fate being so unkind?”

“For fuck’s sake, Megan,” snapped Charles. “It’s not fate, it’s bad luck. Harry, you’ve got to get it together, for Eliza and Eddie’s sake. Come back with us and we’ll start thinking about how to move forward.”

“I don’t deserve you two,” Harry said, sniffing.

“Course you do, old pal. None of this is your fault. Now go pack a bag.”

CHAPTER 41

Harry

January 2007

What’s that you’re playing?” asked Harry, sitting down in an armchair. The deep leather cushion complained with a puff.

Milly and Arabella were on the sofa, both with laptops, discussing the hairstyles of the characters on their screens. Harry wasn’t in fact interested in their game, but it was hard to know what to talk about to the younger generation.

The girls were both at college in London, and were here for Charles’s birthday weekend. Maria had also now left Wales, and was studying theology at Edinburgh.

On learning of Janette’s death, Katie and Cassandra had again offered to look after Eliza, and Eddie too, until Harry could organize a nanny for them. They’d anticipated this would take a week or two, but the little ones had now been gone nearly three months. Yet again, Harry realized how much he took Katie’s good nature for granted.

Spending time with Charles’s girls today had also made him aware, finally, how much he missed Eliza, and that he should be getting to know his baby son. What had he been doing all these weeks? It was time to bring them home.

“We’re playingAlt Life,” said Milly.

“I’ve heard of that. Do you design your own character?”

“It’s an avatar,” said Arabella, without looking up.

“As in the human manifestation of a Hindu deity,” said Harry.

“As in someone you create on a computer, duh.”

“But that’s where the word comes from.”

“Whatever.”

Megan handed Harry a cup of tea and rolled her eyes at her stepdaughter’s response. “I’d forgotten what a mine of information you are,” she said. “And, girls, don’t dismiss Harry as an old fogy. If it wasn’t for him, you might not be enjoying that high-speed internet connection. You’d be stuck watchingSki Sunday.”

Arabella looked up and said, “Oh yeah, I forgot you do internet stuff. Cool! You wanna see, Harry? Hey, we could make you an avatar.”

He went over to the sofa, the two girls shuffling along to make space between them. He squeezed in with difficulty. He’d put on weight again, but had been too wrapped up in his grief to do anything about it. The mirror still terrified him, so he’d also stopped shaving and had grown a beard. Terri had told him he looked like Henry VIII.