‘But it must have generated an income?’ Mohsin asks.
‘It didn’t for ages,’ Maisie says. ‘It’s only been quite recently that it’s been paying anything.’
‘It’s been our only source of income actually,’ Rowena says. ‘Dad’s other businesses didn’t weather the recession very well.’
‘Did you know that you were about to lose all of that money and the income it generated?’
‘Yes,’ Rowena says immediately. ‘We discussed it as a family,’ she continues. She’s trying to be the adult; mature.
‘It wasn’t that big a thing,’ Maisie says. ‘I know that sounds silly. But money isn’t everything, is it? And we’ll be alright. I mean, we’re going to have to sell the house. Get somewhere smaller or rent. But in the great scheme of things, well, that’s not what happiness is about, is it? Where you live? And Rowena’s finished at school now, so there are no more school fees. That would have been the only really hard thing to change, if she’d had to leave her school.’
‘And how does your husband feel about this?’
‘He’s disappointed,’ Maisie says, quietly. ‘He wanted to give Rowena everything. In her second year at Oxford she has to live out of college and Donald had planned to buy her a little flat of her own. We didn’t want her in some student house that could be miles from her lectures and not very safe. And it would be an investment, too, we thought. But clearly… well, that’s not possible. Poor Rowena, it was a big blow.’
But I think there might be a more sinister reason for Donald wanting to buy Rowena a flat. Did he want to continue controlling her, under the guise of indulgent father?
‘I don’t mind not having the flat,’ Rowena says. ‘Really. Not a bit.’
‘And she’ll have to get a student loan and a job while she’s at university,’ Maisie says. ‘And that’s hard. I mean, when you’re studying as well. I don’t mind for me. I mean, I’ve always rather wanted a job, actually.’
‘Mummy, the police officer doesn’t want to hear all of this.’
‘Do you think your father was just disappointed?’ Mohsin asks Rowena.
Maisie quickly answers for her. ‘He was also upset, of course he was. But there was nothing anyone could do about it.’
‘I have to tell you that your husband has been brought into Chiswick police station for questioning.’
‘I don’t understand.’
Rowena is pale. ‘The fire, Mummy. They must think it’s fraud.’
‘But that’s just ridiculous!’ Maisie says. ‘He once joked that he’d burn the place down, but it was just a joke. You don’t joke about something like that if you’re actually going to do it, do you?’
‘I’d like to talk to you in private later, Mrs White, but for now I want to ask Rowena a few questions.’
‘She has nothing to tell you. Nothing.’
‘Rowena? Do you want to talk to me without…’
I see Rowena’s eyes meet Maisie’s.
‘I’d like Mum to stay.’
Gently, thoughtfully, Mohsin probes Rowena about Donald. But each avenue of questioning is blocked off by Rowena’s loyalty. No, he’s never lost his temper. No! He’d never hurt her in any way at all. He’s a devoted father.
As I listen to Rowena’s earnest voice I think how different she is to Jenny. Not just her seriousness and what she’s had to contend with during her life, but even the words she uses. None of them would be found in that dictionary Jenny made for me. I wonder how often she chats to her contemporaries; if she has any friends.
‘You’ve got it all wrong!’ she finally bursts out. ‘Daddy didn’t do anything. He wouldn’t hurt anyone. You’ve got it all wrong.’
As Rowena cries, Maisie puts her arms protectively around her.
She and Maisie have both covered for him over the years, and surely they’re covering for him now.
Jenny thought Rowena ran into the burning building to make Donald proud, but was it to protect him again, by trying to limit the harm he’d done?
I’d thought that you needed love to push you into that burning school. Maybe it was love for her father, however little he deserved it, that had made her go in.
Mohsin, clearly frustrated, winds up his interview. Maisie is going to the police station, despite Mohsin telling her she won’t be allowed to see Donald. I don’t understand her loyalty to him. Not with Rowena being hurt too. I just don’t understand.
But it doesn’t matter. The hows and whys don’t matter.
Adam is cleared.
You are at my bedside, silent. I’m not sure what I expected, hoped for, not a smile on your face, but a relaxation in your body now that Adam is exonerated. But your muscles are wound so tight that your body looks unnaturally stiff; like a marionette.
Where’s the man in the Cambridge tea shop who was going to climb and abseil and white-water raft through life?
When I reach the bed you tell me about the insurance fraud; that Adam won’t be blamed any more. ‘About bloody time too!’ And for a moment there’s an energy in your voice, but that’s as much relief as you have. Because no heart has been found for Jenny and I am still in a coma.
Then you tell me that a heart will be found for Jen, and that I will wake up. And that man is right here by my bedside. Not a marionette but a climber. How absurd I was to think you could relax at all now; how insensitive and stupid. Every fibre of your strength is needed to carry us both up that mountain of hope; our weight is the weight of your love for us; an almost impossible burden.
I’m so sorry for what I said about Ivo earlier. Because we do love each other, I know that. Not with that intensely perfect young love we once had, but with something stronger and more durable. Our love has aged with us; less beautiful, yes – but more muscular and robust. Married love, which is built to last.
I return with you to ICU for yours and Sarah’s changing of the guard at Jenny’s bedside. Despite Donald being in custody, you’ve refused to stop guarding her.
‘Not till the bastard’s admitted it. Not till we’re totally sure.’ Maybe you’re finding it hard to let go of your suspicion of Silas Hyman, despite the evidence against Donald. You need a written confession; something tangible before you’ll desert your post.
Like me, I think that each time you leave her ward and then return you allow yourself to hope that a heart has been found for her. And that somehow not being there will make it more likely; a watched-pot-never-boils on a life-and-death scale.
Nothing has changed.
Jenny is outside ICU.
‘No heart?’ she says and waits a moment. ‘Sounds like a bid in bridge.’
‘Jen…’
‘Yeah. Gallows. Sorry. Aunt Sarah’s phoning Addie and Granny G.’ Her face crumples. ‘He’s in the clear, Mum.’ Her relief is expressed in tears. Her love for Addie is one copper-bottomed fact about her that never changes.
‘About Ivo, Jen-’
She pulls sharply away from me. ‘Lay off the interrogation. Please.’
She walks quickly away and I watch her go.
I think I glimpse someone in a blue coat, getting out of the lift. I hurry towards him.
Is that him, turning a corner towards ICU? God I wish you were here.
I race to catch up.
A group of doctors are going into ICU and I can’t see anyone in a dark coat.
Maybe that’s him, hurrying away, half obscured by a porter wheeling a patient.
But there’s no way they would have let Donald go already. Surely?
Nothing now. The corridors empty, just two nurses in the lift.
I can’t be sure I saw him. I’m probably just jumping at shadows.
In the car park Mohsin is waiting for Sarah.
‘It’s really not good form to be late for your own disciplinary meeting,’ he says, teasing her. But she doesn’t smile.
‘Addie still isn’t talking,’ she says.