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Description
Dinner was a casual affair. Dominic’s University friend, (Lord Brooker of Buckenham, as it turned out) was certainly not in the habit of putting on airs. They ate in the huge, informal, terracotta-flagged kitchen of the house and Gerry helped Sheila out with the food whilst the men washed and dried afterwards and exchanged political gossip and Lady Brooker chatted to Gerry about everything from antiques (about which she was surprisingly knowledgeable) to witchcraft (which came as something of a surprise to Geraldine at first). Sheila was younger than her husband, closer to Gerry’s age than either Charles or Dominic. She seemed aware of Dom’s involvement with the Coven and undisturbed by it, although she had never actually practised herself.
After dinner she showed Gerry around the house and grounds; introduced the High Priestess to her ducks and her two show-jumpers, Miller and Campion and talked away with her as if they had always known one another. As with Dom, Geraldine quickly felt at ease in her company and was beginning to understand just why he had been so keen to accompany her.
“How long have you known DW?” Sheila asked with genuine curiosity.
“Mhh…” Gerry considered, counting backwards in her head with a little frown. “Ages… at least twenty five years now. Doesn’t that make us sound like a right pair of old crows?”
“It might, if you actually looked like a pair of old crows, which…” she added quickly; “…you fortunately don’t!”
Geraldine laughed to show that she was not in the least bit offended by this.
“We’re well-preserved. Dom puts it down to the blood cells that survived in our alcohol streams!”
“I take it DW isn’t showing any signs of settling down yet, since he hasn’t dragged some glamorous boyfriend down here to parade for us,” Lady Brooker chuckled.
Her companion answered with a quick shake of her head. “’fraid not. I keep pestering him about it, but I think he’s had his fingers burned plenty in the past. He seems to be in no great rush to give his heart away.”
“Poor thing,” Sheila sighed. “It’s a terrible waste, don’t you think?”
“He seems content enough,” Gerry mused as they strolled back through the tiny orchard by the duck pond where a nursery of little apple trees, barely as tall as they were, framed their path. The fruit hung heavy on each slender bough and Sheila picked a few as they passed by. “He has plenty of brief flings, and every now and then there’s a deeper intimacy, someone we even get to meet!”
Sheila smiled ruefully. “Has he ever made a pass at you? I mean…” she hurried to cover herself; “…one hears of such things, when two people have been friends for so long. It must become like a marriage, in some sense.”
Gerry wondered silently for a moment just how much Dominic had told his friends about his private life. At last, rather tentatively, she said; “He proposed to me once, you know?”
Sheila’s wide eyes told Geraldine at once that this was news to her. “He did? Gosh! What on earth did you say to that?”
“I told him the truth,” Gerry replied. “I pointed out that he’s not interested in women and I’m not interested in men, therefore it would be something of a pointless exercise!”
“Golly!” her hostess exclaimed in an equally awed tone. “Are you really? Um… not interested in men, I mean?”
“Not remotely,” Geraldine assured her.
“Not ever?” Sheila looked her with fascination, as if she was a rare piece of porcelain or something to be studied.
“I was married once,” Gerry answered, truthfully. “But it didn’t last long. I haven’t had a relationship with a man since, beyond friendships. In truth I think that’s why Dom and I get on. He feels safe with me.”
“But you… umm… you have relationships with women?” Sheila ventured with some trepidation.
Gerry nodded. Her companion looked astonished and intrigued in equal measure.
“Is that very… um… fulfilling?” she wanted to know.
“It is for me,” Gerry responded with a wry smile.
“I don’t think I ever met a real lesbian before,” Sheila giggled.
Geraldine Cowell thought this highly unlikely, but refrained from saying so out loud.
“Do you and Charles have a family?” she asked, to change the subject. There had been no pictures of children on the walls; no baby snaps or proudly framed graduation photos as she would have expected in a family household.
Sheila reached a bench in a sunny spot under the jasmine and sat down, looking suddenly rather deflated.
“No,” she said, a little sadly, as Gerry sat beside her. “We tried, of course. Tried everything, in point of fact. All the cures, the treatments, A.I., supposed fertility chairs in friends’ houses. You name it we’ve been through it. Upshot of it is…” she lowered her voice anxiously, glancing in Gerry’s direction. “Chickie’s firing blanks. Nothing we can do about it, the doctors say. They’ve tried putting him on special diets and health regimes. He sulks for six months and no good comes of it!”
“So you can’t have children?” Geraldine shook her head sympathetically.
“Oh… I could,” Sheila sighed again. “But not with him. It’s a terrible predicament really. We talked about adoption for a little while. But I so want a child of my own, Gerry. It’s eating away at me inside. And the older I get the less likely it becomes that I’ll even conceive.”
To Gerry, who in over twenty years had never seriously felt any desire for motherhood, this was an alien concept. But she was perfectly capable of putting herself in another person’s shoes and was able to sympathise with her companion.
“At least you have each other. You seem to be a very close couple.”
Sheila smiled wearily. “We are. And we have the beasties, who are like family anyway. I just wonder sometimes what it would be like to raise a child of my own. But listen to me, rambling on as if this was a matter of life and death. Poor you, you’ve come down here to bury your father, and I’m sure you don’t want to hear all my problems!”
“We weren’t close,” Gerry answered neutrally. “Not for the last thirty years or so, anyway! I just feel as if I ought to be here.”
“Didn’t you love him at all?” she asked, perplexed and slightly wary of offending her guest.
“Once, I suppose. When I was little. He changed when my mother died, and all my love and trust for him drained away gradually. I moved away once I was old enough to go to college, first to Suffolk, then to London. After I’d graduated I went north, to Nantwich first, then to the shop I run in Marple. I always told myself I was too busy to come down for a visit. And we rarely spoke on the ‘phone. It took something exceptional for him to contact me and I didn’t ring him at all.”
She wondered at herself in that moment. Perhaps it was Sheila’s own honesty in coming out with her hopes and desires that loosened her tongue. Gerry had never told anyone about this, not even Dominic, but there were words in her that were searching for an outlet; admissions that needed to be made before she confronted that grave tomorrow morning. Sheila was a stranger, someone who would not go running to her family or her friends. She felt a small pang of betrayal, even so.
“Losing his wife must have been difficult for him,” Sheila said, echoing Dom’s suggestion.
Gerry folded her hands in her lap with a little sigh, studying her long-boned fingers and short, unadorned nails critically.
“Lots of men become widowers,” she said gruffly. “They don’t molest their daughters as a result!”
There, it was out in the open. To her surprise she felt no pain, only a kind of empty space inside her. She heard Sheila’s sharp intake of breath but could not look up.
“He interfered with you?”
A nod was her only reply. Gerry imagined that words would choke her.
“How… how old were you?”
“Twelve, nearly thirteen,” the other woman told her atonally.
“Did you never want to ask him why?” she enquired unexpectedly.
“No. I just wanted him to stop doing it. And then I just wanted to get away and never come back,” Gerry said, her words intentionally sharp. “I’m glad he’s dead. Does that sound callous?”
“I can’t imagine. It’s not my place to judge,” Sheila answered her diplomatically. “I have no idea what I would have done in your place. Was there no one you could tell?”
Gerry shook her head. “No one I wanted to tell, at least!”
The two women surveyed each other frankly now. Gerry was not sure if she imagined it but thought she saw a grudging respect in Sheila’s gaze. Lady Brooker took her hand and squeezed it reassuringly.
“You survived,” she said adamantly. “And came out of the experience with your sanity intact, which is no small thing.”
“Except that I can’t bear to have a man touch me,” Gerry pointed out.
“Maybe you wouldn’t have anyway,” Sheila suggested with a quiet smile. Her tone sobered; “Does DW know about this?”
Geraldine shook her head.
“No. And I’d be grateful if you didn’t tell him, he’ll only get upset and make an unnecessary fuss about it all.” She had never considered that she might have grown up preferring women without any help from her father before. It was a new idea and one she needed to mull over.
Seeming to sense her withdrawal, Sheila pushed herself to her feet and passed her an apple.
“Come on,” she said briskly, sounding for a moment like one of Gerry’s old art teachers. “Let’s go and find out if the boys have broken any plates while we weren’t keeping an eye on them!”
And she set off back to the house. Only then did Geraldine remember that she had never promised not to say anything to Dom. Again she found herself wondering if she had done the right thing in coming here, but it was too late now to change things. What will be, will be, she told herself grimly, and took a bite from her apple. It tasted sharp and crisp, and reminded her of an unsullied childhood summer so long ago that it was almost gone from her memory.

Dominic was not at breakfast. At first she thought that he was out running, but his car was not on the driveway either. A note from Sheila was pinned on the kitchen door. ‘Feeding the horses. Help yourself to breakfast.’
She did so, but had no appetite for the thinly buttered toast she made, or the coffee that went with it. Her mind was preoccupied with the day ahead. By the time she had showered and was beginning to get ready nerves had set in. There was still no sign of anyone and she was wondering if she should find the number of a cab firm to get herself to Attleborough when she heard the crunch of tyres on the gravel drive out front.
Dominic was in the kitchen when she found him, helping himself to coffee. He was immaculately groomed, in a pristine, charcoal-coloured wool suit, crisp white shirt, black tie and boots, and consulted his watch as she entered the room.
“Are you ready?” he asked, as if no explanation was required for his absence.
“Nearly,” she said. “I just need to get my coat and my bag. Where is everyone?”
“Chick’s gone back to London, on business,” Dominic exhaled. “I’ve been getting dressed…” he gestured casually towards his feet giving her the chance to comment on his attire.
Gerry nodded; “Very nice. Very… not you.”
Dominic blew her a sarcastic kiss. “I expect Sheila’s galloping across a field somewhere with the wind in her hair. Very sensible, if you ask me.”
“You really don’t have to come,” Gerry told him, sensing tension and wondering just what had been said since her chat with Sheila Brooker last night. “Not if you don’t want to.”
“Nonsense,” Dominic replied dismissively. “I have the suit now!”

“Did you sleep well?” she asked, in the car, as they powered down a winding country lane in complete disregard of the speed limit.
“Mmm,” he answered, sounding non-committal.
“Are you angry with me about something?” she demanded, irritated by his off-hand manner.
Dominic looked at her briefly, with a small frown, then returned his gaze to the road. “No. Should I be?”
“You’re not yourself,” she pointed out.
“I have things on my mind,” he responded, braking for a slow-moving tractor up ahead and murmuring an imprecation under his breath.
The tractor swung off to the left into a field and he accelerated smoothly away again.
“You were all right yesterday,” she reminded him.
“Geraldine, can we leave this alone please. I understand that this morning we bury your father, but as you said yourself, it will be no great loss. So, if you don’t mind, I’d rather not… Oh, God Almighty!”
The outburst was so uncharacteristic that she was distracted, and looked ahead even as the car slowed again. In front, for as far as the eye could see there was traffic standing immobile along the meandering carriageway. Dominic’s fingers released the glove compartment and snared an OS map, which he unfurled across the steering wheel as they came to a halt. For a moment he tapped his fingers against the sheet then nodded his head and folded it briskly, tossing it into the back seat. Pulling the Saab onto the verge, he accelerated again, ignoring the filthy looks of the drivers he narrowly passed, until they reached a turning off to the left and quickened away down a side road no more than one car’s width.
“Are you supposed to do that?” Gerry demanded at once, glancing back anxiously over her shoulder.
He gave her a look that was pure contempt, so she tried a different tack.
“That sign at the turning said Private Property. Should we be here?”
Dominic sighed wearily and answered her with another curt question. “Sweetie, do you want to go to this funeral or not?”
She closed her mouth on the argument and stared out of the window feeling hurt and rather perplexed. If he was angry with her then the very least he could do was inform her of the reason why. Although she had a sinking feeling that she knew.
“You didn’t have to come,” she reminded him as they jolted over a cattle grid and turned right, down a dirt track that seemed to run along the side of a field.
“Darling, I’m not annoyed with you. I’m just a little confused,” he said with another sigh.
“I’m sorry,” she blurted out at once, unable to contain herself any longer. “I should have told you. It wasn’t fair to tell Sheila first, it just came out while we were talking and I couldn’t stop myself.”
He was silent and when she looked back at him, she could see from his face that he had not got the slightest idea what she meant. For the second time that morning, she closed her mouth, feeling slightly sick.
“Sheila didn’t say anything, did she?” she whispered at last.
“Are you going to clarify that by explaining what she was supposed to have said to me, or do I have to guess?” Dominic Warren asked in silken tones.
The car stopped in front of a gate and she got out to open it for him rather than answer the question. To her relief he did not drive off without her and once she climbed back in, he only gave her another enquiring look. The Saab rolled on through a small village then reached the outskirts of a larger one. Now the scenery began to look vaguely familiar and Gerry found herself staring out of the window, trying to keep her thoughts together. At the same time, she was desperately curious to know what it was that her companion was so preoccupied with if it was not that he knew the truth.
“She didn’t tell you the real reason why I was angry with my father?” she said at last, quietly.
“She told me nothing of the sort,” Dominic responded at once. “She thought you seemed unhappy and was worried about you but she didn’t say anything to me about your little chat. She had other things on her mind.”
Gerry looked at him at once.
“What other things?”
“None of your business, Geraldine,” he rebuked her gently.
They had pulled into Attleborough as this exchange went on. A church tower loomed up ahead of them and he took a right turning and steered the car to a halt under some tall, chestnut trees growing by the wall of the churchyard. As the engine died, he cast a glance in her direction and found her sitting silently, pensively watching the road, unable to look at him. The tears in her eyes would not subside and she was angry with herself for not containing them. Only when he passed her a handkerchief did she buckle and weep openly.
Immediately he put his arms around her as she cried into the folds of linen, trying to hide her face completely.
“Shhh…” Dominic whispered apologetically. “It’s all right. It’s all right. I’m sorry. Your father… I shouldn’t have lost my temper with you.” His fingers stroked her hair gently.
“No…” she sobbed. “It isn’t all right. I’m sick of pretending, Dom. I’m sick of pretending that everything’s normal when it’s not.”
“I don’t understand,” he protested. “I told you it wasn’t your fault, darling. I’m not annoyed with you, really I’m not!”
She shook her head.
“It isn’t that. I feel so terrible,” she sniffed miserably. “You’re my best friend in the whole world. I should be able to tell you anything.”
“Sometimes it’s hard to tell even those we love the truth,” he said ambiguously.
“But I told Sheila… and then I felt guilty because if I told anyone it should have been you. And I thought that was why you were angry.”
He looked briefly surprised, then glanced up despairingly as a pair of long, black vehicles pulled ahead of them almost silently.
“I hate to rush you, sweetheart, but I think that’s our curtain call.”

To be continued...

Description
Dinner was a casual affair. Dominic’s University friend, (Lord Brooker of Buckenham, as it turned out) was certainly not in the habit of putting on airs. They ate in the huge, informal, terracotta-flagged kitchen of the house and Gerry helped Sheila out with the food whilst the men washed and dried afterwards and exchanged political gossip and Lady Brooker chatted to Gerry about everything from antiques (about which she was surprisingly knowledgeable) to witchcraft (which came as something of a surprise to Geraldine at first). Sheila was younger than her husband, closer to Gerry’s age than either Charles or Dominic. She seemed aware of Dom’s involvement with the Coven and undisturbed by it, although she had never actually practised herself.
After dinner she showed Gerry around the house and grounds; introduced the High Priestess to her ducks and her two show-jumpers, Miller and Campion and talked away with her as if they had always known one another. As with Dom, Geraldine quickly felt at ease in her company and was beginning to understand just why he had been so keen to accompany her.
“How long have you known DW?” Sheila asked with genuine curiosity.
“Mhh…” Gerry considered, counting backwards in her head with a little frown. “Ages… at least twenty five years now. Doesn’t that make us sound like a right pair of old crows?”
“It might, if you actually looked like a pair of old crows, which…” she added quickly; “…you fortunately don’t!”
Geraldine laughed to show that she was not in the least bit offended by this.
“We’re well-preserved. Dom puts it down to the blood cells that survived in our alcohol streams!”
“I take it DW isn’t showing any signs of settling down yet, since he hasn’t dragged some glamorous boyfriend down here to parade for us,” Lady Brooker chuckled.
Her companion answered with a quick shake of her head. “’fraid not. I keep pestering him about it, but I think he’s had his fingers burned plenty in the past. He seems to be in no great rush to give his heart away.”
“Poor thing,” Sheila sighed. “It’s a terrible waste, don’t you think?”
“He seems content enough,” Gerry mused as they strolled back through the tiny orchard by the duck pond where a nursery of little apple trees, barely as tall as they were, framed their path. The fruit hung heavy on each slender bough and Sheila picked a few as they passed by. “He has plenty of brief flings, and every now and then there’s a deeper intimacy, someone we even get to meet!”
Sheila smiled ruefully. “Has he ever made a pass at you? I mean…” she hurried to cover herself; “…one hears of such things, when two people have been friends for so long. It must become like a marriage, in some sense.”
Gerry wondered silently for a moment just how much Dominic had told his friends about his private life. At last, rather tentatively, she said; “He proposed to me once, you know?”
Sheila’s wide eyes told Geraldine at once that this was news to her. “He did? Gosh! What on earth did you say to that?”
“I told him the truth,” Gerry replied. “I pointed out that he’s not interested in women and I’m not interested in men, therefore it would be something of a pointless exercise!”
“Golly!” her hostess exclaimed in an equally awed tone. “Are you really? Um… not interested in men, I mean?”
“Not remotely,” Geraldine assured her.
“Not ever?” Sheila looked her with fascination, as if she was a rare piece of porcelain or something to be studied.
“I was married once,” Gerry answered, truthfully. “But it didn’t last long. I haven’t had a relationship with a man since, beyond friendships. In truth I think that’s why Dom and I get on. He feels safe with me.”
“But you… umm… you have relationships with women?” Sheila ventured with some trepidation.
Gerry nodded. Her companion looked astonished and intrigued in equal measure.
“Is that very… um… fulfilling?” she wanted to know.
“It is for me,” Gerry responded with a wry smile.
“I don’t think I ever met a real lesbian before,” Sheila giggled.
Geraldine Cowell thought this highly unlikely, but refrained from saying so out loud.
“Do you and Charles have a family?” she asked, to change the subject. There had been no pictures of children on the walls; no baby snaps or proudly framed graduation photos as she would have expected in a family household.
Sheila reached a bench in a sunny spot under the jasmine and sat down, looking suddenly rather deflated.
“No,” she said, a little sadly, as Gerry sat beside her. “We tried, of course. Tried everything, in point of fact. All the cures, the treatments, A.I., supposed fertility chairs in friends’ houses. You name it we’ve been through it. Upshot of it is…” she lowered her voice anxiously, glancing in Gerry’s direction. “Chickie’s firing blanks. Nothing we can do about it, the doctors say. They’ve tried putting him on special diets and health regimes. He sulks for six months and no good comes of it!”
“So you can’t have children?” Geraldine shook her head sympathetically.
“Oh… I could,” Sheila sighed again. “But not with him. It’s a terrible predicament really. We talked about adoption for a little while. But I so want a child of my own, Gerry. It’s eating away at me inside. And the older I get the less likely it becomes that I’ll even conceive.”
To Gerry, who in over twenty years had never seriously felt any desire for motherhood, this was an alien concept. But she was perfectly capable of putting herself in another person’s shoes and was able to sympathise with her companion.
“At least you have each other. You seem to be a very close couple.”
Sheila smiled wearily. “We are. And we have the beasties, who are like family anyway. I just wonder sometimes what it would be like to raise a child of my own. But listen to me, rambling on as if this was a matter of life and death. Poor you, you’ve come down here to bury your father, and I’m sure you don’t want to hear all my problems!”
“We weren’t close,” Gerry answered neutrally. “Not for the last thirty years or so, anyway! I just feel as if I ought to be here.”
“Didn’t you love him at all?” she asked, perplexed and slightly wary of offending her guest.
“Once, I suppose. When I was little. He changed when my mother died, and all my love and trust for him drained away gradually. I moved away once I was old enough to go to college, first to Suffolk, then to London. After I’d graduated I went north, to Nantwich first, then to the shop I run in Marple. I always told myself I was too busy to come down for a visit. And we rarely spoke on the ‘phone. It took something exceptional for him to contact me and I didn’t ring him at all.”
She wondered at herself in that moment. Perhaps it was Sheila’s own honesty in coming out with her hopes and desires that loosened her tongue. Gerry had never told anyone about this, not even Dominic, but there were words in her that were searching for an outlet; admissions that needed to be made before she confronted that grave tomorrow morning. Sheila was a stranger, someone who would not go running to her family or her friends. She felt a small pang of betrayal, even so.
“Losing his wife must have been difficult for him,” Sheila said, echoing Dom’s suggestion.
Gerry folded her hands in her lap with a little sigh, studying her long-boned fingers and short, unadorned nails critically.
“Lots of men become widowers,” she said gruffly. “They don’t molest their daughters as a result!”
There, it was out in the open. To her surprise she felt no pain, only a kind of empty space inside her. She heard Sheila’s sharp intake of breath but could not look up.
“He interfered with you?”
A nod was her only reply. Gerry imagined that words would choke her.
“How… how old were you?”
“Twelve, nearly thirteen,” the other woman told her atonally.
“Did you never want to ask him why?” she enquired unexpectedly.
“No. I just wanted him to stop doing it. And then I just wanted to get away and never come back,” Gerry said, her words intentionally sharp. “I’m glad he’s dead. Does that sound callous?”
“I can’t imagine. It’s not my place to judge,” Sheila answered her diplomatically. “I have no idea what I would have done in your place. Was there no one you could tell?”
Gerry shook her head. “No one I wanted to tell, at least!”
The two women surveyed each other frankly now. Gerry was not sure if she imagined it but thought she saw a grudging respect in Sheila’s gaze. Lady Brooker took her hand and squeezed it reassuringly.
“You survived,” she said adamantly. “And came out of the experience with your sanity intact, which is no small thing.”
“Except that I can’t bear to have a man touch me,” Gerry pointed out.
“Maybe you wouldn’t have anyway,” Sheila suggested with a quiet smile. Her tone sobered; “Does DW know about this?”
Geraldine shook her head.
“No. And I’d be grateful if you didn’t tell him, he’ll only get upset and make an unnecessary fuss about it all.” She had never considered that she might have grown up preferring women without any help from her father before. It was a new idea and one she needed to mull over.
Seeming to sense her withdrawal, Sheila pushed herself to her feet and passed her an apple.
“Come on,” she said briskly, sounding for a moment like one of Gerry’s old art teachers. “Let’s go and find out if the boys have broken any plates while we weren’t keeping an eye on them!”
And she set off back to the house. Only then did Geraldine remember that she had never promised not to say anything to Dom. Again she found herself wondering if she had done the right thing in coming here, but it was too late now to change things. What will be, will be, she told herself grimly, and took a bite from her apple. It tasted sharp and crisp, and reminded her of an unsullied childhood summer so long ago that it was almost gone from her memory.

Dominic was not at breakfast. At first she thought that he was out running, but his car was not on the driveway either. A note from Sheila was pinned on the kitchen door. ‘Feeding the horses. Help yourself to breakfast.’
She did so, but had no appetite for the thinly buttered toast she made, or the coffee that went with it. Her mind was preoccupied with the day ahead. By the time she had showered and was beginning to get ready nerves had set in. There was still no sign of anyone and she was wondering if she should find the number of a cab firm to get herself to Attleborough when she heard the crunch of tyres on the gravel drive out front.
Dominic was in the kitchen when she found him, helping himself to coffee. He was immaculately groomed, in a pristine, charcoal-coloured wool suit, crisp white shirt, black tie and boots, and consulted his watch as she entered the room.
“Are you ready?” he asked, as if no explanation was required for his absence.
“Nearly,” she said. “I just need to get my coat and my bag. Where is everyone?”
“Chick’s gone back to London, on business,” Dominic exhaled. “I’ve been getting dressed…” he gestured casually towards his feet giving her the chance to comment on his attire.
Gerry nodded; “Very nice. Very… not you.”
Dominic blew her a sarcastic kiss. “I expect Sheila’s galloping across a field somewhere with the wind in her hair. Very sensible, if you ask me.”
“You really don’t have to come,” Gerry told him, sensing tension and wondering just what had been said since her chat with Sheila Brooker last night. “Not if you don’t want to.”
“Nonsense,” Dominic replied dismissively. “I have the suit now!”

“Did you sleep well?” she asked, in the car, as they powered down a winding country lane in complete disregard of the speed limit.
“Mmm,” he answered, sounding non-committal.
“Are you angry with me about something?” she demanded, irritated by his off-hand manner.
Dominic looked at her briefly, with a small frown, then returned his gaze to the road. “No. Should I be?”
“You’re not yourself,” she pointed out.
“I have things on my mind,” he responded, braking for a slow-moving tractor up ahead and murmuring an imprecation under his breath.
The tractor swung off to the left into a field and he accelerated smoothly away again.
“You were all right yesterday,” she reminded him.
“Geraldine, can we leave this alone please. I understand that this morning we bury your father, but as you said yourself, it will be no great loss. So, if you don’t mind, I’d rather not… Oh, God Almighty!”
The outburst was so uncharacteristic that she was distracted, and looked ahead even as the car slowed again. In front, for as far as the eye could see there was traffic standing immobile along the meandering carriageway. Dominic’s fingers released the glove compartment and snared an OS map, which he unfurled across the steering wheel as they came to a halt. For a moment he tapped his fingers against the sheet then nodded his head and folded it briskly, tossing it into the back seat. Pulling the Saab onto the verge, he accelerated again, ignoring the filthy looks of the drivers he narrowly passed, until they reached a turning off to the left and quickened away down a side road no more than one car’s width.
“Are you supposed to do that?” Gerry demanded at once, glancing back anxiously over her shoulder.
He gave her a look that was pure contempt, so she tried a different tack.
“That sign at the turning said Private Property. Should we be here?”
Dominic sighed wearily and answered her with another curt question. “Sweetie, do you want to go to this funeral or not?”
She closed her mouth on the argument and stared out of the window feeling hurt and rather perplexed. If he was angry with her then the very least he could do was inform her of the reason why. Although she had a sinking feeling that she knew.
“You didn’t have to come,” she reminded him as they jolted over a cattle grid and turned right, down a dirt track that seemed to run along the side of a field.
“Darling, I’m not annoyed with you. I’m just a little confused,” he said with another sigh.
“I’m sorry,” she blurted out at once, unable to contain herself any longer. “I should have told you. It wasn’t fair to tell Sheila first, it just came out while we were talking and I couldn’t stop myself.”
He was silent and when she looked back at him, she could see from his face that he had not got the slightest idea what she meant. For the second time that morning, she closed her mouth, feeling slightly sick.
“Sheila didn’t say anything, did she?” she whispered at last.
“Are you going to clarify that by explaining what she was supposed to have said to me, or do I have to guess?” Dominic Warren asked in silken tones.
The car stopped in front of a gate and she got out to open it for him rather than answer the question. To her relief he did not drive off without her and once she climbed back in, he only gave her another enquiring look. The Saab rolled on through a small village then reached the outskirts of a larger one. Now the scenery began to look vaguely familiar and Gerry found herself staring out of the window, trying to keep her thoughts together. At the same time, she was desperately curious to know what it was that her companion was so preoccupied with if it was not that he knew the truth.
“She didn’t tell you the real reason why I was angry with my father?” she said at last, quietly.
“She told me nothing of the sort,” Dominic responded at once. “She thought you seemed unhappy and was worried about you but she didn’t say anything to me about your little chat. She had other things on her mind.”
Gerry looked at him at once.
“What other things?”
“None of your business, Geraldine,” he rebuked her gently.
They had pulled into Attleborough as this exchange went on. A church tower loomed up ahead of them and he took a right turning and steered the car to a halt under some tall, chestnut trees growing by the wall of the churchyard. As the engine died, he cast a glance in her direction and found her sitting silently, pensively watching the road, unable to look at him. The tears in her eyes would not subside and she was angry with herself for not containing them. Only when he passed her a handkerchief did she buckle and weep openly.
Immediately he put his arms around her as she cried into the folds of linen, trying to hide her face completely.
“Shhh…” Dominic whispered apologetically. “It’s all right. It’s all right. I’m sorry. Your father… I shouldn’t have lost my temper with you.” His fingers stroked her hair gently.
“No…” she sobbed. “It isn’t all right. I’m sick of pretending, Dom. I’m sick of pretending that everything’s normal when it’s not.”
“I don’t understand,” he protested. “I told you it wasn’t your fault, darling. I’m not annoyed with you, really I’m not!”
She shook her head.
“It isn’t that. I feel so terrible,” she sniffed miserably. “You’re my best friend in the whole world. I should be able to tell you anything.”
“Sometimes it’s hard to tell even those we love the truth,” he said ambiguously.
“But I told Sheila… and then I felt guilty because if I told anyone it should have been you. And I thought that was why you were angry.”
He looked briefly surprised, then glanced up despairingly as a pair of long, black vehicles pulled ahead of them almost silently.
“I hate to rush you, sweetheart, but I think that’s our curtain call.”

To be continued...