Part 33 (2/2)

'All right, Gwennie?' Bob said. 'How's tricks?'

'Is that supposed to be funny?'

Bob grinned. 'Just an expression.'

Gwen shoved her bag out of the way and laid her head dramatically on the scarred surface of the table. 'Everyone hates me. I'm a disaster. I should just leave. Oh, no. I forgot, I can't because I've got no money. No career.' She was about to add no boyfriend, but was beginning to sound pathetic even to herself.

'From what I hear, you're the hero of the hour,' Bob said.

Gwen lifted her head to look at him. 'What?'

Bob swiped his cloth around. 'Oh, yes, Fred says his chilblains have never felt better. Isn't that right, Jack?' Bob called out to an old man in a tired brown suit. Gwen had seen him before and he always seemed to be seated in exactly the same place, wearing the same suit. Perhaps he had a whole wardrobe of identical outfits, but Gwen doubted it. Jack raised rheumy eyes from the newspaper that he held close to his face. 'What's right?'

'Our Gwennie is a regular hero.'

'She's a good girl.' Jack nodded. He gave Gwen a rare smile, showing uneven teeth, then disappeared behind his paper.

'You keep up like this, they'll build you a b.l.o.o.d.y statue,' Bob said.

'No, thank you,' Gwen said, trying not to think about the little memorial to Jane Morely on the wall of the pub.

'Suit yourself.' He shrugged. 'Half the town thinks you're some kind of guardian angel, anyway.'

Bob's friendly smile wasn't enough to make Gwen ignore the flaw in his sentence. 'What about the other half, though?' she said. 'What have they been saying?'

Bob looked away. 'You don't want to worry about that.'

'They think I'm a fraud. That I'm playing some long con. That one day, they'll wake up and I'll be gone with the town's riches in my back pocket, or that I'm corrupting the town's youth, or bringing shame onto Pendleford and ruining its reputation and its chance for development grants or tourism or whatever.'

'Whoa, there, Gwennie.' Bob waved his bottle of cleaner. 'Not so dramatic. I don't think most people have thought about it that much.'

'Some have,' Gwen said, 'and, unfortunately, they tend to be pretty vocal.'

'Have you thought about answering back?' Bob said.

'That doesn't usually work out that well for me,' Gwen said, thinking of Ruby.

'Maybe you need to raise your voice,' Jack said unexpectedly. He didn't look up from his paper or speak again so Gwen looked at Bob. He raised his eyebrows and shrugged, as if to say: the octogenarian with alcohol-dependency issues has a point.

Gwen shook her head. 'Haven't you heard that phrase ”the lady doth protest too much”? Who on earth is going to believe a word I say, however loudly I say it?'

Bob retreated behind the bar. 'You're the one with all the brains, Gwennie, but if I were you, I'd think about something concrete. Evidence for the defence kind of thing.'

Gwen closed her eyes. Even vaguely legal jargon made her think about Cam. Made her feel a little bit turned on, truth be told. She blinked quickly and got the h.e.l.l out of the pub before she embarra.s.sed herself in front of Bob and the town's oldest barfly.

I wish Gloria would let me see the girls or, at least, give them the choice. I'm old enough to know that life isn't fair, but I've spent the last fifty years giving people what they need, whether I've wanted to do it or not, even when it's made people hate or fear me; it doesn't seem right. And not just for myself. Poor Gwen will be coming into her gift all alone. She only has Gloria to guide her and that's worse than nothing. Gloria will teach her that you help only when you see benefit to yourself and that is not a good path to walk. It leads to some very dark places.

Gwen clipped the entry out and added it to the pile that she counted as 'hers'. She had several piles, now, each with a Post-it note stuck on the top and a person or family's name, as well as a non-magical recipes pile, one full of herbalist cures, and the notebook for Ruby. She looked at the few sheets which bore Helen Brewer's name and wondered if she was being punished for taking money for finding Archie. If she was completely honest, she'd felt a creeping guilt about that ever since. The letter from Christopher's solicitor had been almost a relief. As if her comeuppance had finally arrived and she could deal with it. Being sued for defamation of character wasn't top of her bucket list, but it could be worse. And Cam had said that Christopher didn't have a s...o...b..ll's chance in h.e.l.l anyway.

Across town, Gwen parked her car in Helen Brewer's quiet cul-de-sac and rang the doorbell before she could think about it too much.

'What do you want?' Helen didn't take the security chain off, but she didn't slam the door shut either. Gwen tried to feel cheered by this.

'May I come in?'

'Christopher isn't here.'

The tip of Helen's nose was bright red. Whether from cold or crying, Gwen couldn't tell. 'I wanted to talk to you, actually. Five minutes?'

Helen shook her head violently. 'It won't do any good. I can't control Christopher.'

'That's okay. It's not about that.'

Helen shut the door and Gwen heard the chain jangle. It opened again and Helen stepped backwards. 'Five minutes.'

The house was just as Gwen remembered it; unnaturally tidy and filled with more pastel colours than seemed sensible with a dog. She perched on the pale pink sofa. 'How's Archie?'

'Fine,' Helen said. 'Thank you,' she added, looking embarra.s.sed.

'I just came to bring you something.' Gwen wished she'd planned something to say. It suddenly seemed unbelievably awkward. 'I've been going through my great-aunt's papers.'

Helen went very still.

'And I feel a bit weird about it, really. She kept lots of notes, like diaries, but not really about her own life.'

'Stuff about other people.' Helen's voice was barely a whisper.

Gwen stood up to pull the folded sheets of paper from her back pocket. She pa.s.sed it across. 'I don't know what to do. I don't want to know this stuff, so I was just going to burn the lot, but it doesn't really feel like my property.'

Helen read the notes quickly, blus.h.i.+ng. 'You could use this against Christopher. Get him to drop the stupid legal thing. I told him not to sue you. I told him-'

'That would be blackmail,' Gwen said. 'I wish I hadn't read this and I'd rather just forget that I did. It's none of my business.'

Helen gave her a long look. 'You're very different to Iris.'

'Good,' Gwen said. 'I think.'

Helen folded the pages. 'I'm sorry about Christopher. It turned out you were right about him. I saw him kick Archie. On Monday night, when he thought I was at bridge.'

'I'm sorry,' Gwen said.

Helen shook her head. 'I thought I'd raised him better than that.'

Gwen stood up. 'Well, thank you for seeing me.'

Helen rose and walked her to the door. The wind had picked up and was howling outside, a cold draught flowing in from the badly fitted letterbox.

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