Part 41 (1/2)

”Oh, I know it is,” said Laura impatiently. ”But you just said yourself, there's a big part of you that's you, just yourself, and that's the bit you need someone to share with you.” His eyes searched her face; she looked at him, imploring him to understand. ”And here-this room, all these people. They're the bit that complicates everything. They're the reason we can't be together.”

She lapsed into silence, still holding his hand, not knowing what to say next.

Nick laughed suddenly in the gloom of the room, a warm, comforting laugh. ”Laura, oh, Laura.” He stroked her collarbone, and she s.h.i.+vered at his touch.

”What?” she said.

”You're right, you know, but I think you're taking it too seriously.”

”I-”

”Look,” said Nick, with the air of one trying to be reasonable. ”I want to talk to you. Properly, about all of this. But I want to kiss you first. You're right, this room's a bit daunting. So. Let's go somewhere else.”

”Just like that?” said Laura. ”It's as simple as that, is it?”

”Absolutely,” he said. ”The trouble with you is, you overthink everything. I like you, you like me. Let's go and sit on the steps and talk. Without great-grandmothers A, B, and C watching us.”

He bent his head and kissed her, quickly, hard on the lips, and then said, ”Okay?”

”Okay,” said Laura. ”Okay.”

”Come on,” he said, holding her hand again, and they walked back up the length of the room and paused near the doorway. Laura could see Charles, circling in the background of the great hall. She was sure he was looking for Nick, and she didn't want him to come, didn't want them to have to separate, wanted to stay like this forever.

”Well, I'm glad I've seen this room, anyway,” she said. ”I don't want you to think I didn't like it. It's-er, it's lovely.”

”What a polite guest. My pleasure,” said Nick. ”All mine.”

”All yours,” she said, laughing at the absurdity of it all. ”I'm glad you found me here.”

”I was looking for you, Laura,” he said. ”And now let's go.”

The gallery doors were flung wide open; Charles strode into the room, his phone in his hand. ”There you are.”

”Hey,” said Nick, but Charles wasn't looking at him, he was walking toward Laura.

”Laura, my dear,” he said, with the same kind face he always had. Laura smiled at him, but her blood froze as she looked into his eyes, saw their expression. ”Your aunt's looking for you. You're going to have to go. It's-it's your grandmother, Laura. She's had a ma.s.sive heart attack. She's in the hospital. It's not good. She's asking for you. Laura, your mother needs you to go back to London. Tonight.”

chapter forty-nine.

A s long as Laura lived, she would never forget that journey. Bizarre details. The mints Aunt Annabel had in her car. The travel atlas; half the cover was torn off, so unlike the Sandersons. The way Annabel drove, wildly, hunched over the steering wheel, her face pale in the darkness, her makeup like a mask. Those things that Laura had unpacked so carefully, painfully, a few short hours ago, now flung randomly into the suitcase. They should have just left, should have asked the others to send things on, Laura realized afterward as the journey went on, deeper into night, as Annabel drove in silence and they both had time to think.

Yes, Laura had time to think; hours of time. It was over three hours from Chartley Hall to the hospital in town; but what could she think about? Nothing. Her mind couldn't concentrate, couldn't consider what she might find there, what might not be there. She didn't understand, couldn't process it all. When she tried to think about it, it was as if her brain had short-circuited. Nick had offered to drive; Annabel had practically pushed him away, racing to the car, roaring away from the house in a frenzy that Laura had never seen before.

They tried to talk at the beginning of the journey, but both of them were so overwrought and worried that conversation was hard.

”Where are they?” Annabel asked, as Laura finished a call to her mother. They had been driving for over half an hour. Laura glanced at a sign; they were still in Norfolk. Oh, hurry, hurry, she thought, please hurry.

”Still at the hospital. They're all there.”

”Who?”

”Mum, Dad, Simon. Cedric and Jasper. And Fran and Robert.”

”Where's Lulu?” said Annabel instantly.

”I don't know.... I didn't ask.”

”Why isn't she there?” Annabel said. Since she had no way of knowing or finding out, Laura said nothing. ”What did they say?”

”They said she's unconscious now. But she has been talking. I think-” Laura's voice faltered; she wasn't used to saying things like this, didn't know the language. It was too easy to default to cliches from hospital television shows or books. ”I think she's worse.”

”What's she been saying?” said Annabel sharply.

”I don't know,” said Laura. ”Mum didn't say. Except-she was-except she was asking for me. She wanted to see me and Simon. She recognized him.”

”Just Simon?” Annabel hunched over the steering wheel even higher, peering at the road ahead as if willing the car to take flight and soar across the countryside, take them back to Mary.

”I don't know,” Laura said again, feeling helpless. ”I don't know.”

”Well, you're her grandchildren, not Fran, I suppose.” Annabel cleared her throat. ”And if Lulu's not there-perhaps she's waiting for her to get there.”

”I'm not sure,” said Laura. ”Aunt Annabel-I don't think she knows what's going on.”

There was a dull stabbing pain behind her eyes, like something crawling, scratching them. This was all wrong. Mary wasn't someone in a hospital, dying! She was the most alive person Laura knew. Her place in the world was so sure. She knew what she knew, was so certain of everyone and everything, which was why she was the most rea.s.suring grandmother one could possibly have.

”Come on, come on,” Annabel muttered. She bit her lip. Laura looked at her. She looked awful; it was as if she had aged about twenty years, but there was something more than that. Her composure was the first thing that struck one about Annabel; it was her most noticeable quality, more than her glossy brown hair, her perfect makeup, her glamorous, determined air, her rather braying voice. It was the quiet certainty that her world was right, that she was right. Now, looking at her aunt, Laura felt she was seeing a tiny bit of the other Annabel she might be for the first time, and it was a strange experience.

They were on a main road finally, thankfully, and the electric strip lighting overhead bathed their faces in a ghostly green light. It was one of those endless, featureless roads, its only characteristics of interest blue signs, chevrons, traffic cones. Nothing else was visible from the road. They could have been anywhere in the country. Laura blinked, trying to remember where she'd been; but already the memory of Chartley, of Nick and what he had said, what it had all meant-it was racing far into her mind, already framed and deposited in a memory bank, a lovely pure snapshot of something in the past. She couldn't connect it with this.

Laura shunted down in her seat, wrapping her slightly-too-big-for-her jacket around her for warmth. She looked down. She was still wearing Nick's jacket, the one he had put around her in the picture gallery-that was this same evening, wasn't it? Her mind scrabbled to remember, and the creatures pinching behind her eyes grew more frantic.

”Are you cold, Laura dear?” said Annabel, her voice quiet and hoa.r.s.e. ”Perhaps we should stop here and get some coffee.”

”No, no,” said Laura, feeling a wave of panic at the suggestion. ”No, please, Aunt Annabel, please-just keep driving.”

”Of course,” said Annabel. She flicked a look at her niece, very briefly. ”Darling. You mustn't get too upset, you know.”

Don't say it, thought Laura. I'll be fine if you don't say it.

”She's eighty-five, you know. She's had a good life. A very good life.”

”Shut up,” said Laura quietly, ferociously. ”Don't, Aunt Annabel. I mean it, don't.”

”Laura!” said Aunt Annabel, but her voice was still soft. ”Listen to me. It's not a cliche with your grandmother, you know. She has had a good life. One of the best. Wonderful times she had with-with Xan, and everyone. She's been everywhere. She knows everyone. She hasn't had a moment's illness.”