The Hidden Years Read online

  Faye… Headaches… Sage frowned. No one had ever told her that Faye suffered bad headaches… But then, why should they? She had long ago opted out of the day-to-day life of the house and its occupants. Long, long ago made it plain that she was going to go her own way, and that that way was not broad enough to allow for any travelling companions.

  It was a perfect late spring morning, with fragile wisps of mist masking the grass, and the promise of sunshine once it had cleared.

  The telephone was ringing as Sage went downstairs. She picked up the receiver in the hall, and heard a woman whose name she did not recognise asking anxiously after her mother.

  'We heard about the accident last night, but, of course, we didn't want to bother you then. And it's very awkward, really. There's this meeting tonight about the proposed new road. Your mother was going to chair it… I doubt that we'll be able to get it cancelled, and there's no one really who can take her place…'

  The action committee Faye had told her about. Sage suppressed a sigh of irritation. Surely the woman realised that the last thing they wanted to concern themselves with right now was some proposed new road…? And then she checked. Her mother would have been concerned; her mother, whatever her anxiety, would, as she had always done, have looked beyond the immediate present to the future and would have seen that no matter how irritating, no matter how inconvenient, no matter how unimportant such a meeting might seem in the face of present happenings, there would come a time when it would be important, when it would matter, when she might wish that she had paid more attention.

  'Faye and I have already discussed the problem,' she said now, suppressing her impatience. 'She suggested that I might stand in for my mother, as a representative of the family and the interests of the mill. I believe my mother had files and reports on what is being planned. The meeting's tonight, you say…? I should have read them by then…'

  She could almost hear the other woman's sigh of relief.

  'We hate bothering you about it at such a time, but your mother was insistent that we make our stance clear right from the beginning, that we fight them right from the start. The Ministry are sending down a representative to put their side of things, and the chairman of the contractors who'll be doing the work will be there as well… If you're sure it's not going to be too much trouble, it would be wonderful if you could take your mother's place.'

  Sage could hear the relief in her voice and wondered a little wryly if her caller would continue to place such faith in her abilities to step into her mother's shoes once they had met.

  'No trouble at all,' she responded automatically, as she made a note of the exact time of the meeting and promised to be there fifteen minutes earlier so that she could meet the rest of the committee.

  'Was that the hospital?' Faye asked anxiously, coming downstairs towards her. If anything her sister-in-law looked even more drawn this morning, Sage recognised, turning to answer her, and even more frail.

  Why was it that when confronted with Faye's ethereal, haunted delicacy she immediately felt the size of a carthorse and twice as robust? And, even worse, she felt rawly aware that as her mother's daughter she ought to be the one who looked harrowed to the point of breakdown.

  'No, it was a Mrs Henderson; she's on the committee for the protest against the new road. She was ringing about this evening's meeting. It's just as well you'd mentioned it to me, otherwise I shouldn't have had a clue what she was talking about. I've arranged to be there fifteen minutes before the meeting starts. I'm afraid that means I'm going to have to spend the afternoon reading through Mother's papers and files, which means that you'll be left to field telephone calls and enquiries.

  'Jenny was telling me when she brought my tea that virtually half the village came round yesterday to ask how Mother is. If you're finding all this a bit much, Faye, and you'd like to get away for a few days…'

  Immediately Faye went so pale that Sage felt as though she'd threatened her in some way and not offered her an escape route from the pressure she was undoubtedly suffering. She was so sensitive that the constant enquiries about her mother's health, the constant reminders of how slim her actual chances of full recovery were, were obviously proving too much for her.

  'Oh, no…I'd rather stay here…but if I'm in your way…'

  'In my way!' Sage grimaced. 'Faye, don't be ridiculous, nor so self-effacing; this is your home far more than it has ever been mine. I'm the one who should be asking you that question. In fact I was going to ask if it would be too much of an imposition if I moved myself in here for the duration of Mother's recovery. And, before you say anything, that means all the extra hassle of my clients telephoning here, and I'm afraid I'll have to sort myself out a workroom of some sort. I can take some time off but…'

  'But if Liz does recover, it's going to be a long, slow process,' Faye finished bleakly for her.

  'Yes. I was thinking about that this morning. Last night, in the euphoria of knowing that she was at least alive, one tended to overlook the fact that being alive is a long way from being fit and healthy…'

  'I suppose deep down inside I wasn't ready to acknowledge then that Liz might not recover. I've leaned on her for so long…' Faye pulled a small face. 'I wish I could be more like you—independent, self-sufficient… But realising how dangerously ill Liz is brought home to me how much I've come to rely on her…'

  So that was the reason for her sister-in-law's wan face—well, there was one issue on which she could reassure her right away, Sage decided, and said bluntly, 'I can't promise you that Mother will recover, Faye, but if you're worrying about the practicalities of life…well, should the worst happen, then please don't. Cottingdean will always be your home. Knowing my mother, she'll have done the sensible thing that so few of us do and already drafted her will. I'm quite sure that in it she will have made it plain that Cottingdean will eventually belong to Camilla…' She saw that Faye was going to object and stopped her. 'No…please don't think I should mind. I shouldn't… If anything, I'm the one who is the intruder here, who doesn't belong, and, please, if you'd rather I went back to London and left you to manage here without me, don't be afraid to say so.'

  'That's the last thing I want,' Faye told her honestly. 'I couldn't possibly cope on my own, and as for this not being your home…' She went a faint and pretty pink with indignation. 'That's nonsense and you know it.'

  'Is it?' Sage asked her drily, and then concluded, 'Heaven knows how long you're going to have to put up with me here, but I want you to promise me that if there are any problems caused by my presence you'll come right out and tell me. I'm not very good at being tactful, Faye, nor at reading subtle hints of displeasure. If I'm responsible for something happening that you don't like, just tell me.'

  'I think Jenny's the one you ought to be saying that to, not me.' Faye smiled at her. 'She's the one who's really in charge.'

  Sage had turned to walk towards the small sunny breakfast-room where Jenny had said she would serve their breakfast, and, as Faye fell into step beside her, the latter asked hesitantly:

  'And Alexi—will he mind that you'll be living here and not—?'

  'What Alexi minds or doesn't mind no longer matters,' Sage told her crisply. 'And if he rings up and makes a nuisance of himself, Faye, just hang up on him. I'd planned to visit the hospital this morning and then I ought to call in at the office—there'll be a few arrangements. I'll have to have my calls and post transferred here… Would you and Camilla like to come to the hospital with me, or would you prefer to visit Mother on your own, now that the doctor says visits are allowable?'

  'No, we'll come with you, if you're sure that's all right…'

  They were in the breakfast-room now. It faced south and was decorated in warm shades of yellow with touches of fresh blue.

  Outside, Jenny's husband was already working in the garden. The breakfast-room had french windows which opened out on to a small private terrace with steps leading down to a smooth lawned walk flanked by double borders encl
osed by clipped yew hedges that carried the eye down the length of the path to focus on the statue of Pan at the far end of the vista.

  When her mother had first come to Cottingdean, neither the borders nor the vista had existed, just a wild tangle of weeds. What faith she must have had in the future to plan this mellow green perfection out of such chaos, and yet how could she have had? Cottingdean had been a decaying, mouldering ruin. There had been no money to restore it, and certainly no money to spend on creating an elegant and useless garden; she had had a husband whose health was uncertain, a baby on the way… no family, no friend, no one to help her, and yet in her first summer at the house she had sat down and planned this view, this garden, knowing that it would take years to mature.

  Why? In the past Sage had always attributed her mother's vision to stubborn pride, to a refusal to let anything stand in the way of her will, and yet now, illuminatingly, she suddenly saw her actions as the kind of wild, impulsive, desperate thing she might have done herself: a fierce battling against the weight of burdens so crippling that one either had to defy them or be destroyed by them.

  'Sage, are you all right?'

  As Faye touched her arm in concern, she turned to look at her, unaware of the stark anguish and pain that shadowed her eyes.

  'I was just thinking about Mother's garden,' she said shakily, 'wondering what on earth gave her the faith to believe it would ever come to fruition.'

  She could see that Faye didn't understand: why should she? Faye hadn't, as yet, read the diaries, and stupidly Sage was reluctant to suggest that she should, not yet… not until… Not until what? It was ridiculous of her to have this sensation of somehow needing to protect her mother, to make sure that… That what? It was her mother's wish that they all read what she had written… all of them…

  'Here's Camilla,' Faye announced, breaking into her too introspective mood. She turned to her daughter as she hurried into the breakfast-room via the terrace and reproached her gently, 'Darling, I think you ought to have gone upstairs and changed before breakfast, I'm sure Sage doesn't want to eat hers sitting next to someone who smells of horses…'

  'Gran never minded,' Camilla said fiercely, as though daring Sage to object.

  They had always got on well together, she and this child of David's, her niece, but now Sage could see in her eyes a shadow of uncertainty and rejection. Because Sage was taking her mother's place… Because Camilla had known of the lack of love between the two of them, and felt resentful on her grandmother's behalf. She was such a fiercely loyal child, so deeply emotional and sensitive.

  'Neither do I,' Sage responded equably, and then asked, 'Did you enjoy your ride? I rather envied you when Jenny told me you'd gone down to the stables.'

  She sat down, taking care to avoid the chair which had always been her mother's, the one which afforded the best view of the garden.

  Without seeming to be, she was aware of Camilla watching her, aware of the younger girl's faint relaxation as Sage said calmly to Faye, 'I think you're going to have to take over Mother's job of pouring the coffee, Faye. I never did get the knack of doing it without dripping the stuff everywhere…'

  'Gran told me that it used to be a test that would-be mothers-in-law set for their sons' girlfriends: to make them pour the tea,' Camilla informed them.

  Sage laughed. 'So that's why I've never managed to get myself a husband. I've often wondered.'

  They all laughed, the atmosphere lightening a little. Sage left it to Faye to inform Camilla that they were all going to visit the hospital together. While she was doing so, Jenny came in with a cardboard box, full of newspaper-wrapped shapes, which Sage realised must be her mother's Sevres breakfast set.

  'I've put in a packet of her favourite tea, Russian Caravan, and some of those biscuits she likes so much…'

  'Is that for Gran?' Camilla asked Jenny curiously.

  'Yes, Sage thought that Liz would enjoy having her tea out of her favourite Sevres breakfast set and she asked me to wrap it up so that she could take it to the hospital.'

  'Oh, yes… Gran loves that set, she always said…says…' Camilla faltered, darting a quick, anxious look at her mother '… that it makes her tea taste extra specially good.'

  'Well, it will be a long time before she can actually use it,' Sage warned her, not adding the words all of them felt—a long time, if ever…

  'Sage will want to make an early start,' Faye informed her daughter. 'She's standing in for your grandmother at tonight's meeting of the action committee and she wants to spend later this afternoon going through Liz's files, so as soon as you've finished your breakfast I suggest you go upstairs and get changed.'

  'And then I think that perhaps from tomorrow you can go back to school,' Sage suggested quietly but firmly, pretending not to see the grateful look Faye gave her.

  When asked for her opinion Camilla had objected to being sent away to boarding-school, and instead had asked her mother and grandmother if she could attend a very good local day school. She was now in her A level year, with a good prospect of getting to Oxford, if she worked hard, and on this subject at least Sage didn't need to wonder what her mother would have wanted Camilla to do.

  'I know you'll be anxious about your grandmother,' she continued, seeing the words already springing to Camilla's lips, 'but if you're honest with yourself, Cam, you'll know that she'd have wanted you to continue with your school work. She's so proud of you… Every time I see her she tells me how thrilled she is that you'll probably be going to Oxford. The last thing she'd want would be for you to neglect your studies—and don't worry. We'll make sure that you get to visit her, even if it means my taking you in to London myself.'

  'I wish she were closer to us… Can't she be transferred to Bristol or Bath?'

  'Not at this stage,' Sage told her, adding gently, 'She's in the best possible place, Camilla… The facilities at St Giles's are among the most advanced in the country. Perhaps later when she's recuperating…'

  She wondered if she ought to do more to prepare her niece for the visual gravity of the intensive care ward with its machinery and tubes, its high-tech austerity and the shocking contrast of one pale, frail human body among all that alien machinery, and then decided not to do so. Camilla was of a different generation, a generation for whom machinery, no matter how complex, was accepted as a matter of course. Camilla might not necessarily find the sight of the intensive care ward shocking as she had done, but rather reassuring, taking comfort from the knowledge that the most advanced techniques were being used to support the frail thread of life.

  Sage was driving through the heavy London traffic when Camilla suddenly asked her, 'How are you getting on with the diaries…? I meant to ask you last night, but I'd gone to bed before you'd finished.'

  'I haven't finished the first one yet,' Sage lied, knowing that she was making an excuse for not yet having passed the diary on to Faye as they had arranged.

  'What's in it? Anything interesting?'

  Sage had no idea what to say. Her fingers tensed on the wheel and as she fumbled for words, for something to say, Faye unwittingly came to her rescue by telling her daughter, 'Liz wanted us all to read the diaries separately…to learn from them individually…'

  'Yes, that's right, she did.'

  'Will you finish the first one tonight, then?' Camilla pressed.

  It was almost as though she sensed her caution, her reluctance to discuss the diaries, the fact that she was deliberately withholding something from them, Sage recognised.

  Only she knew how much she had been tempted to go back downstairs last night to go on reading… As for finishing more of the diaries tonight… She had no idea how long the meeting would go on for, but what she did know was that she would be expected to make copious notes… to record faithfully every detail of what had taken place for her mother's later assessment, if not for the rest of the committee.

  Odd how, now, when her mother could not physically or emotionally compel her to act in the way she considere
d right and proper, she was actually compelling herself to do so… The details of her own work, her own commitments, she carried around with her in her head, much to the irritation of her secretary—she had never been methodical, never been organised or logical in the way she worked, always taking a perverse and contrary delight in abandoning routine and order to follow a seemingly careless and uncontrolled path of her own.

  And yet here she was meticulously planning to follow in her mother's orderly footsteps, as though in doing so she was somehow fulfilling some kind of sacred trust, somehow keeping the flickering flame of her mother's life-force alive.

  Ridiculous… emotional, idiotic stuff… and yet so powerful, so strong, so forceful was its message within her that she was compelled to listen to it and to obey.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  'I hadn't realised—it was almost as though Gran wasn't there at all.' Camilla shivered, despite the centrally heated warmth of the hospital.

  'She's heavily drugged, Cam,' Sage told her gently. 'The nurse said that it was to give her body a chance of getting over the shock of the accident and her injuries…'

  Camilla swallowed visibly, suddenly a child again as she pleaded anxiously, 'She isn't going to die, is she, Sage…? I don't want her to die…'

  Sensing the hysteria lurking beneath the plea, Sage turned to her and took her in her arms. 'I can't answer that question, Cam. I only know, as you do, that if anyone can survive this kind of thing your grandmother will do so…'

  Sage was wondering if they had been wise allowing Camilla into the intensive care unit. She had seen the compassion in the nurse's eyes when Camilla had visibly reacted to the sight of her grandmother hooked up to so much machinery, her body still, her eyes shuttered, to all intents and purposes already gone beyond any human help.