EXPOSURE

Avril Osborne

Copyright© 2010 by Avril Osborne

Smashwords Edition

www.avrilosborne.co.uk

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Table of contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Other Books

EXPOSURE

CHAPTER 1

Susan is not used to being kept waiting. Outside, the rain of early spring is falling like stair rods - vertical and piercing. It is the kind of rain that soaks in seconds. Impatient, she eyes the door, watching for Linda. She always enjoys these meetings, even if they are only occasional now. They are the social get-togethers of two women who do not question why they consider themselves best friends. Time pressures mean only infrequent suppers together, but still, each of them has had support and an unquestioning, listening ear for nearly fifteen years.

Because they meet so seldom, it is all the more unusual for Linda to be late.

“And she says our time together is precious,” Susan mutters to herself. Sometimes, she wonders why she bothers. Life is busy, after all.

At least the warm atmosphere of the bistro helps to dry her hair and jacket. If there is one thing that she hates it is being less than immaculate and tidily groomed. She is sufficient of a personality to be recognised, and the public, she finds, somehow expect her to have the same sartorial elegance when they see her out and about in the city, as when she is on television. It is as well that she has only a limited capacity for alcohol. It controls her intake and bleary eyes just will not do when she appears on screen tomorrow.

A young man seems to recognize her and hovers before intruding. Pardon him for asking, but is she Susan Blakely? Ah. Well, could he possibly have Miss Blakely’s autograph, just to prove to his wife that he has seen the celebrity? Susan is glad at this moment that her cheek-length blonde hair is in place now, its shape accentuating her high cheekbones as it frames her face. And her clothes are stylish and expensive enough to ensure that ordinary city rain will not spoil them or fail to show her tall, slim shape to its full advantage. With her legs crossed and her skirt slightly open at the slit, her presence stands out amongst even this sophisticated, power-dressing assembly of early evening diners.

The autograph seeker heads on his way after a few minutes of polite admiration for Susan. He wanted to know just a little bit about Susan’s career, but she was not about to get into deep conversation. Still, it is gratifying when people are interested.

Linda finally appears in the restaurant doorway, shaking her brolly and scanning the tables. Susan catches her eye and waves. Tall, dark and slim, but still more heavily built than Susan, she is a good-looking woman. Her dress, though, is just that little bit out of date by comparison with Susan’s attire, but together, they make a striking pair of friends to any onlookers.

“Sorry I’m late,” Linda apologises now, obviously genuinely regretting that Susan must have been sitting here for over thirty minutes whilst she wrapped up her day at the University.

Susan listens as Linda describes a late evening meeting about finances, which was convened in something of a hurry by Linda’s boss. It was a heated debate, apparently – one of those meetings where personality issues get in the way. Linda had no choice but to sit the meeting out, not even able to reach Susan by her mobile phone. Susan’s unnoticed exasperation takes its time to dissolve as Linda settles now at the table, the account of work tapering off as she too sheds the stress of the day. Linda’s genuine frustration and apology make it easy for her to forgive the wait. Susan decides to pitch right in to what is on her mind.

She has Linda’s attention right away.

“Tell me, Linda, illness or madness? Love is one or the other. I’m never sure which.”

“Probably both,” Linda laughs, after a second’s thought. “But would you be without it? I take it this is about Bill?” As she asks this, she gives her friend a quizzical look and rallies to the question, clearly putting all thought of University to the back of her mind. She sips a first taste of the white wine that sits ready for her on the table, visibly relaxing as she does so.

Susan looks into her wine glass, holds it up towards her friend in greeting and takes a sip before replying.

“No, I suppose not – I wouldn’t be without it, I mean. But it consumes so much of your energy. And there’s barely time to lead the rest of your life.”

“Come on, Susan,” Linda protests with a wry smile. “You’ve been with Bill for over a year and look what you have done in the same time. Career, holidays, a life style to envy. And you have time to meet me – even if only occasionally.”

She gives Susan a slightly chastising grin as she says the last words.

“Is that the mildest of jibes?” queries Susan, pulling a face in acknowledgement. “Anyway,” she continues, “ I suppose I deserved that. Come on - let’s get some food. It’s my treat by way of recompense for your kindness in putting up with me. We can talk as we eat.”

And, Susan reflects, as she and Linda queue at the vegetarian counter, selecting an aubergine casserole and various salads, wine and cheese, Linda has indeed been patient, not badgering her to keep up the weekly suppers that shaped their time together till Bill arrived on the scene. Instead, Linda has been cheerfully available on the occasions when Susan has managed to ring. She guesses that Linda knows that these are the evenings when Bill is out of town or at meetings and that she is being fitted in. Linda never alludes to this and certainly never complains. Linda, Susan admits, is always very forbearing.

As they return to the pine table and put plates, wine carafe and cutlery in front of them, Susan picks up the theme of her friend’s loyalty.

“You have been very patient, you know, and I do appreciate it. If this is the only time I can make for being with my best friend, heaven knows what my shrinking social circle will be like, the next time I have time to look.”

“Well, friends who are worth having will still be around when you come out of your ‘madness and illness’ phase, as you call it. We all know what it is like to be in love, even if it’s a long time ago for the likes of me.” Linda laughs at herself with evident ease. “Others will only have existed as friends of the moment and the moment will have passed.”

She pauses before continuing.

“You know,” she muses, “They say that it’s not love that’s the divisible commodity; it’s only time. There is always enough love to go round. There’s just not enough time.”

Susan says nothing; just thinks about some of the times in her life when she could have been more generous of spirit and less jealous. As if sensing Susan’s discomfort, Linda veers the conversation to lighter areas.

“Anyway, how is Bill? Let’s get back to that. Dare I ask – how’s it all going between you?”

Susan holds Linda’s gaze for a moment, measuring how to respond. She knows that Linda is asking a searching question in the lightest way, so giving her the choice between a truthful and a more superficial response. Susan decides on saying it how it is.

“He’s a nice man, Linda, and we are still wrapped up in each other most of the time. He is kind and attentive and thoughtful.” Susan finds these descriptions slowly, as if trying them on for the first time to see whether they really fit. “And, I have to say, the sex is good.” she adds, with a quick glance and grin at her friend.

Linda says nothing except “but?” and smiles with an enquiring look, waiting for Susan to continue.

“He wants us to move in together.”

“Ah. And is that not what you want?”

“Well, I’m not sure that it is. I should be thinking “yes!” but – well, I’m really doubtful. I suppose, if I’m honest, it’s partly Bill and partly me. I just don’t feel ready for the all-consuming attention he pours on me. I also don’t feel I’m ready to give that sort of commitment myself.”

“Well, that’s pretty clear,” Linda says, wryly. “It sounds to me as if you are coming out of the madness and illness phase and beginning to look around you again.”

“I suppose so,” muses Susan, reluctantly.” But if that’s so, I have to say that I’m sorry too. At the beginning, you know, I thought ‘this is it’. Now I’m thinking there must be something wrong with me.”

“Nonsense,” Linda retorts abruptly. “You are only thirty-five, for God’s sake. You have the life of a careerist and you are a city girl – the modern woman in just about every respect. You of all people should know that there’s more to life than the perfect love.” She labours the last three words.

Susan is silent, reflecting on what Linda has just said. And she realizes that she has been too silent for too long, thinking about being a careerist, as Linda has just described her. Is it always career or relationships, like two dichotomous options?

“Are you disappointed about your feelings for Bill?” Linda probes.

“No, not at all,” Susan protests and doubts her certainty as soon as she speaks. “You can’t feel for someone what you don’t feel for them,” she sighs. “I suppose, if I’m honest, I am more disappointed that I have never experienced that thing you refer to as the perfect love. No, I was thinking about how I came to be in the city. It’s been five years now, all with the T.V. Company. You would think I could have made a better job of my personal life. It seems so out of step with my professional persona. God, if the great public only knew.”

Linda hesitates for a moment before replying, and keeps her eyes on her plate as she does so.

“Susan, there really is no problem with your personal life. I envy you the spontaneity you can bring to a relationship. Don’t undermine the person you present as being on TV. It’s all you, you know.”

Susan just laughs and lets Linda continue.

“Anyway, three relationships in fifteen years is hardly a big deal. They were nice blokes, maybe with the exception of that Dave Ramsey - I never could fathom him out. Mind you, I only met him once or twice. And the way he’s been behaving since you and Bill got together, phoning you, driving round past the house - it’s very odd.”

“I don’t know now what I was doing, seeing that appalling man,” Susan says with real contempt in her voice. “But it’s more than that,” she goes on, returning to the subject of Bill. “It would be good to be settled – I can’t think of anyone kinder than Bill. Any advice, Linda?” She laughs as she asks this, but Linda can see that she really wants to know what Linda thinks.

“The old adages are the best. If in doubt, don’t. But then, you know what they say about advice.”

Susan laughs and shrugs to change the subject.

“Bring me up to date on what has been happening with you.”

She braces herself for concentration. Linda is a professor of archaeology. Her preoccupations at the moment centre on a text that she is producing on the significance of recent archaeological excavations of an Iron Age village on an outer Hebridean island. Susan does her best to ask intelligent questions on a subject that they both know holds little interest for her.

Later, over coffee, she enquires about Linda’s husband, Ken, and their children, but when she does so she realizes that Linda’s attention returns quickly to a planned excursion by the University Department to the excavation site in the summer recess.

Half an hour later, when Susan feels that neither of them is going to take the conversation to any deeper or more interesting areas, she glances at her watch and begins to bring the evening to an end.

It is dry enough outside now for them to agree to walk to the taxi rank. As they stroll, Linda slips an arm through Susan’s and reflects on the evening.

“You know, it has been so good to spend time with you. Even when I’ve had a lousy day at work, it’s still important to me to have you to myself from time to time. But you and Bill should come over really soon and spend the day with the children and us. Why not make it one Sunday when you aren’t working?”

“Agreed,” Susan smiles and gives her the usual woman-to-woman hug which was so well accepted in their social circles. As if as an afterthought, she ventures, “And, you know, Linda, when I do need to talk, it’s you I turn to.”

She is the first to pull away from the taxi rank and she turns to wave, but her friend is occupied in giving directions to the driver who will take her in the opposite direction. For a split second, she thinks she recognises the outline of the man who emerges from the shadows of a shop doorway. But she dismisses the thought. It must be a trick of the mind. They have just mentioned Dave Ramsey and she is imagining things; that is all. Nevertheless, she feels herself shiver with a mix of distaste and fear.

CHAPTER 2

As she puts the frisson to the back of her mind and settles in the taxi, Susan thinks how true it is that she talks mainly to Linda. In a way, she talks with Bill about her relationship with him and the things that they share. But they now skirt around the questions of the future and whether it could become something more permanent. She recognizes that she has gone beyond the ‘here and now’ stage of being in love but that, almost inevitably, Bill will soon ask her to make a definite decision about moving in together. This keeps her avoiding topics that could lead them into this subject. With Linda, however, she has talked over the years about her relationships as she chooses, evaluating them, celebrating them and laughing at herself in them.

She has, after all, known Linda since their London days. They were good pals then, their friendship growing and deepening when they met up again after Susan moved to the city. They bumped into each other again at a University function to which Susan was invited. Linda was recently appointed to the Archaeology Department. After that, it suited them both to coffee or supper together in the city, on their own, and away from Linda’s family commitments. Susan is not terribly interested in the domestic side to her friend’s life, other for observing the courtesies.

Despite their closeness, she never divulges too much about the intimate and sexual aspects of her relationships to Linda. Then again, this is a boundary that most women friends respect – at least while the relationship with the particular man lasts. Tonight, she did not want to delve too deeply into her feelings, sensing that she needed to protect herself from her own question – whether there is something wrong in not having made a fully committed relationship by this stage in her life. She comforts herself that, as Linda says, many women of her age are single and career-minded, and have changed men from time to time. The average age for marrying is, after all, increasing all the time.

Susan’s taxi driver is the silent type, and she enjoys the few minutes for reflection. She always finds that an evening with Linda has this effect on her. At thirty-five, Susan has had a full and eventful life since leaving university. She was fired, at that time, by socialist and feminist ideals. Since then, her career has given her personal and professional freedoms shared by not many women of her generation. Well-educated and untrammelled by any strong religious conviction, she considers herself to have a basic set of values of good and bad, right and wrong which were inculcated by an agnostic, middle of the road professional family. After graduation, several of her friends were heading for teaching or professional secretarial courses. Her own instinct was that, ultimately, both of these routes would be dull, male dominated fields, and so, not for her. By marching on her intellect, she reasoned, she would compete on an equal basis in an unequal world.

A career in television, she decided, was to be her route to this freedom of opportunity. Inspired by the notion of speaking for truth and for justice – or so she told the selection panel at interview – she was accepted for a post-graduate diploma course at a London School of Journalism.

The taxi driver has to prompt her back from her thoughts. He has stopped, parallel to cars parked by the kerb and is aware from looking at her in his mirror that she is lost in her own thoughts. Vaguely embarrassed, she tips him well and alights. This is one area of the city where she feels reasonably safe at night. She lives in the western and smart neighbourhood only a mile or so from the centre, but already leafy and with enormous houses from a different era. Architect designed properties have in-filled many of the grounds of these impressive houses but the area still manages to retain its expensive look.

Susan enters her first floor flat just before eleven. Hers is Victorian, one of two flats converted from the original house. It cost her more than she could afford at the time when she bought it but, on the other hand, it has increased in value by almost eighty percent over the few years she has lived here. And she likes the luxury of the combed ceilings, the four elegant rooms and the en-suite bathroom to her own bedroom. The last word in kitchen fittings gives the flat a feel of being a new home within an old frame and, although she is not in the slightest domestically inclined, she enjoys entertaining in the atmosphere of intimate sophistication that her home conveys.

She has to feel for the light switch to illuminate her entry. The flat is warm and, as she goes down the hall, the wall clock strikes the hour. In the kitchen, she opens the fridge to pour herself a glass of mineral water. The downstairs neighbour has been in and laid her mail on the kitchen work surface.

Absent-mindedly, she only scans the envelopes, knowing that anything of interest will be on her laptop in e-mail form. There are two bills and some circulars. Her next automatic steps are to turn up the volume on the answer phone, press the playback switch and head for the bedroom. She undresses as she listens. The first two messages are work related – one to arrange a meeting with Jonathon Whitney, her boss, the second an administrative assistant asking her to contact the office about travel arrangements for a forthcoming programme. She moves into the bathroom and starts to remove eye makeup with a cotton wool pad. The taped message that follows stops her at once.

“It’s me. It’s over, Susan. I’m ending it. And it’s your fault.”

That was Dave Ramsey. She recognizes the voice straight away, first with a groan, then with cold alarm. There are no more messages. She moves to the phone, picks up the receiver and dials the recall number.

“You were called today at 22.44,” intones the electronic voice. “The caller withheld their number.”

She plays the message again, suddenly and irrationally uncomfortable in her bra and pants. She has heard accurately. She struggles to get her thoughts together. Is it a suicide threat? Is it a real suicide call? It could be either. Could it be something else? Reluctantly, she dismisses the idea. The ‘it’ in the message that is over is her relationship with Ramsey. It must be what he is referring to – even if she finished that over two years ago. It has to be a suicide call - of some sort.

Susan’s thoughts jumble. She is concerned for herself – not for Dave Ramsey. He has been nothing but a dependant wimp at the time and a bloody nuisance since.

What should she do? Nothing? It is an attractive proposition to do nothing. After all, this is probably no more than Ramsey ‘upping the anti’ in his usual post-rejection behaviour. He has made numerous phone calls over the many months, after all. He has followed her and he has sent plenty of pleading letters – all of which she has ignored. Can she afford to ignore this one? No, not if the threat is for real. Not that she worries, she realizes, about Dave Ramsey taking his life. “More fool him,” she mutters aloud to no one. She sees the advantage in Dave Ramsey being dead and out of her hair for good.

But reason and sense kick in. She knows that she cannot ignore this because she cannot afford questions in the public domain. The public domain is her world and if, later, it comes out that she had such a message and did nothing, it would not look good. That would not suit her responsible image of social commentator.

‘Mind you,’ she calculates, ‘I need not necessarily have listened to the answer phone. I came home late and went straight to bed. Who would be any the wiser?’

Then it dawns on her with an expletive. “Damn. I rang number recall. That will be traceable.” Quite who would trace this, she is not clear. But she well knows the power of the media when it comes to investigative journalism.

So here she is, with someone probably threatening suicide and blaming her. If she takes the risk and ignores the call – and nothing happens – her professional reputation will be unaffected. But if she takes any action at all she could expose herself to questions – questions that she would rather not answer.

The last thing she wants is any prying interest into why Dave Ramsey, a rather down at heal and bespectacled postgraduate student of theology with a dull secretary for a wife, should be linked to Susan Blakely, presenter of ‘Tonight Live’ on Regional T.V. If she does nothing and the idiot kills himself, leaving a trail back to her, she will be doubly exposed. Once would be by her connection to him, once by doing nothing in response to the phone message. Then again, if Ramsey does not go through with his threat, she might needlessly make the relationship public herself.

It takes her a few minutes as she finishes undressing and cleaning off her make-up to gather her thoughts and to come to a decision. She decides to play the situation as a concerned acquaintance, on the assumption that Ramsey really does have suicide in mind. But now what should she do? She can hardly ring the mousy wife, Brenda. That could reveal too much to Dave’s sad little spouse. She barely knows the woman, but from what little she has seen of her, she would hardly be of much help in a crisis. Who can she ring? The GP would be best but Susan has no idea who Ramsey’s doctor is.

“Oh God,” she groans out loud. “I suppose there’s no alternative.”

She lifts the phone directory, looks up the local police station in the suburbs where she knows Dave Ramsey lives and dials the number.

“Good evening. Could I speak to the officer on the duty desk? Fine. My name is Blakely. I don’t know whether this is an emergency or not but I came in a few moments ago to find a message on my answer machine from someone I know slightly. It could be a suicide threat. I was not sure whether to ring you or not.”

She listens to the voice on the other end of the phone and repeats the message on the machine, verbatim, for the policeman’s benefit.

“Dave…. Ramsey, I think his name is. I am pretty sure it is his voice. He’s something to do with theology at the University. He lives at nine, Tiverton Drive. I looked it up in the directory before I rang.”

“Well, no, I didn’t ring his house. To be honest I hardly know him. And I only know his wife slightly. I think that she is a bit nervy and I didn’t want to alarm her. I thought you would have more experience of this sort of thing.”

“My name? Yes - it’s Susan Blakely.” She gives her address and phone number. If they know who she is, they do not comment.

“I have no idea,” she responds to a question as to why the phone call might have come to her. “Well, to be honest, I have had a bit of trouble with him – nothing serious. Just a couple of phone calls. And I do see him about.”

“Well yes, I will be here. I was just going to bed.”

“Of course,” She replies. She hangs up and removes the cassette from the answer phone in response to the request to do so which she has just received from the police. She notes that the quarter hour sounds on the hall clock. She feels both relieved and anxious at once at the line she has just taken.

She is wakened at 12.40 to the sound of the doorbell rang. She must have crashed into sleep and it takes her a second to work out that the bell is the door and not the screeching train of her dream. She struggles to the door in a daze and pushes the intercom button.

“Miss Blakely. Can we come in? It’s the police,” says a woman’s voice. A second or two later, Susan sees the woman’s uniform through the spy hole of her front door. A police sergeant is with her.

“Are you alone?” the sergeant asks solicitously as she walks to the lounge ahead of the officers.

“Yes, but that’s O.K. I take it this is about Dave Ramsey? What happened? Can you say?”

“Yes, I’m afraid so. He was admitted to the city hospital. He took an overdose. We found him in his car inside the University campus a short while ago.”

CHAPTER 3

The Pilar family was still up when Linda walked through the front door and into the large square entrance hall. Theirs is a mid-wars, two storied house, built with no expense spared when they renovated it and brought it up to modern day standards. It has a graceful, square appearance that Linda appreciates every time she comes home to its central hallway that is itself the size of a room. She listened to the sound of the family. Their nanny was already upstairs, light classical music emanating from her room off the square landing.

Ken was in the downstairs study working on an interactive medical programme on the computer. Over six feet tall and well built, his round, even-tempered face gave up its concentration to greet his wife. He could never be called handsome but he is an imposing presence that seems to make him attractive to many women admirers. It is a standing joke at the surgery that it is a good thing that he is the faithful type. She smiled and waved in through the door at her husband.

The children, Angela and Kenny, were already in night attire, still managing to look child-like as they lay on parallel sofas in the lounge, absorbed in some high action film. She kissed both youngsters on the forehead, and got an answering smile and a hug from Angela and a manly nod from the two years older Kenny. At twelve, Angela still has a favourite teddy who watches TV with her.

“Have you two had a good day?” she asked and got only nods in return.

She conceded victory to the television and, with an exaggerated sigh, half threatened, half promised to return later. With a tired sigh, she eased into the safety of the study she and Ken share and abstractedly accepted his great bear hug and kiss.

“So, how was Susan?” Ken enquired.

“Fine. I’ve invited her and Bill to Sunday lunch as soon as she can make it. I’m not sure that the relationship is going to hold, though, from what little she said.”

“Mm. Shame. Bill’s a solid sort of guy. And that would be good for her. Mind you – maybe that’s precisely why it won’t work. It always strikes me that Susan is the equivalent of the lad who is sewing his wild oats – not ready to settle down, in case her freedom is restricted. But there is something else – I can’t quite put my finger on it. Maybe she is still becoming the person she is going to be.”

Linda did not reply. She knows of old Ken’s ability to touch on the essence of a person. Then again, he is a doctor and has done a fair amount of training in psychology – a particular interest of his. Sometimes, though, he is judgemental and the last thing she needed was an opinion on this friend of hers who prefers her company to the company of her and Ken together.

Instead, they talked about the day’s work. Ken was hard pressed at the medical centre where he shares a practice with five other general practitioners and two dozen or so ancillary staff. He also lectured to the post-graduate school at the University, albeit only for an hour. His evening was less pressured; one of family time. And his family is everything to him. Tonight, he willingly concerned himself with being home by seven to let the nanny away to a concert, to cook pasta and meat sauce for the kids and to listen to accounts of their days.

Linda listened in turn to Ken’s description of the children’s days. Angela had a pretty ordinary day. She is still adjusting to being in secondary education with all the pressures of the new academic curriculum and new friends in the making. She is the socialite of the two children. If her first attempts at science subjects are anything to go by, she will not be following her father into the medical profession. Still, she is obviously bright and her aptitude for languages is beginning to emerge. Kenny’s day was dominated by his rugby session after school where he earned the title ‘man of the match’ for a particularly good tackle. He also acquired a large bruise over one eye to which Ken gave a few moments professional attention, to reassure himself more than the youngster. Young Kenny was barely unperturbed – there was no serious damage. Kenny was too high with his rugby success to discuss the lessons of the day.

Much as he prefers Linda to be home in the evenings, Ken also secretly loves these times of parenting, and always has. Linda, both professionally and socially, has always had a busy life outside the home. This was her lifestyle before they married and she was not about to give it up in marrying Ken. Notions of ‘quality time’ were prevalent as she was rearing the children as infants and the debate was ongoing then, as always, about the role of women as mothers in the working world. Should they work or not, socialise or not, have equal career opportunities or not? Their particular way as a couple was smoothly paved, as two professional salaries came together at more than twice their separate value.

Children in bed, the couple continued their conversation, mainly on practical arrangements for the next day, as they undressed. Linda told Ken about the gross behaviour of her male colleagues at the meeting on budget cuts as she removed make-up. Absent-mindedly, she acknowledged an appreciative glance from Ken as he caught her eye in the mirror. She is best described as a handsome woman. At five foot eight inches, she is tall until, that is, she stands by Ken. She has short dark hair and what she knows to be piercing brown eyes, softened by the laughter lines of early middle age. And she means to keep her good looks. As a young woman, she played hockey, squash and netball and was recognized as an able sportswoman at both school and university. These days, she limits herself to sailing, walking and running, and to the occasional skiing trip. But her physical fitness matters to her and when time permits she uses her lunch breaks to work out in the gym. She is not going to let her well-built physique go to fat.

The comfort of their marriage is as evident in the bedroom as in the rest of their day-to-day lives. Tonight, as most nights, they embrace as they finish their conversation, turn out the light and settle to sleep. As most nights, Ken’s arm is round her waist, a hand holding her left breast.

Linda lies in the dark, drifting quietly now with some time to herself and with her own thoughts. Five years older than she is, Ken is a warm and safe place to be in every sense and, thankfully, he does not press his sexual attention on her too often. He has long since sensed that their relationship and the family well-being are enhanced by his only occasionally – maybe once at a weekend – initiating lovemaking with his wife. She knows the reason for this but has never spoken of it to Ken. She has never felt that ‘in love’ craziness that she and Susan talked about just a few hours ago. They are friends; she and Ken. At least, that is how she feels about their marriage. There is nothing she can do about the fact that Ken feels differently; would want more.

She is just drifting off when the phone rings, pulling them from the edge of sleep. Ken answers it, each of them anticipating as they struggle to wakefulness that this must be some major medical emergency. He passes the phone to Linda, shaking her arm, and grunting, “Susan”.

“Hello”, is as much as Linda can muster as she peers at the radio alarm and sees that it is just after one o’clock. Then she listens as Susan says that something has happened, she does not want to say what on the phone and she knows it is the middle of the night. But could Linda come round?

Awake now, and knowing that this is unlike level-headed Susan, Linda reassures her friend that she is on her way and asks if she is all right until she gets there. Ken, perplexed, but accepting the situation, is only vaguely concerned that his wife is going out at this time. He offers to drive her but they agree it is safer for her to take a taxi and for Ken to stay with the children. After a few instructions to Ken for the morning routine, she leaves within fifteen minutes and arrives at Susan’s flat before one-thirty.

Susan seems tense but calm as she opens the flat door. Linda hugs her and says simply,

“What’s happened?” She scrutinises Susan. Her worst fear is that Susan has been raped.

Susan, looking as if already regretting her call, leads her into the lounge where a pot of herbal tea sits ready for them both. She pours out two mugs as Linda sits on the edge of the sofa.

“The police have only just left,” Susan says.

Linda’s eyes widen in unspoken question.

“Dave Ramsey has overdosed. He left a message here on the answer phone, blaming me.”

“Oh God,” is Linda’s response, at once realizing some of the implications. Then, “Is he dead?”

“No - at least not yet. Apparently, it was mainly paracetemol. His stomach has been pumped but they don’t know yet whether he will live. Paracetemol damages the liver and, if that packs up, he’ll die.”

Linda knows the medical significance of this particular route to suicide. You cannot live with a medical man without gleaning a fair amount of knowledge in these matters.

Linda starts to gather her thoughts.

“What did the answer phone message say?”

“Very little.” Susan recounts it. “The police were here to get the tape. They were asking pretty difficult questions. Apparently, there is a letter but they won’t say what’s in it.”

“What questions did they ask you, Susan?” asks Linda, focussed on what she imagines will be the central issues.

“Why would someone I barely know blame me? Basically, that was it. But they came at it in different ways as if they know more. I stuck to the line that I’d met him when I interviewed him for a TV show. I said that I had drinks with him and with Mike, our cameraman, afterwards, and he started to get in touch with me here at the flat. Nothing more – other than that he got a bit troublesome. I kept to a line about seeing this as a young married minister who got a bit confused and never really intended to step out of line with his wife or with the church.”

“Did they buy it?”

“I don’t know. I can be pretty convincing. That’s my job. But it all depends what’s in the letter, doesn’t it?”

“Where was the letter?”

“They didn’t say. It could have been in the car. Or – dear God – it could have gone to his wife.”

Linda sits quietly, holding the mug in both hands, and asks,

“Susan, is there something you haven’t told me about this Dave Ramsey? I thought it was a stupid one-night stand but that you had both agreed to let it drop for your own sakes as well as his wife’s? I also thought it wasn’t – well - important to either of you?”

Susan looks at her friend and obviously decides to say something in part explanation of the situation.

“Well, it was a bit more complicated. It was basically just a very brief affair, as far as I was concerned.”

Linda just a raises eyebrow, as if to say, ‘was that wise?’ Then she asks, “How long did it go on?”

“Yes, yes, I know,” Susan says, answering the unspoken criticism, “He is a minister, and I have this job. I’m in the public eye. The implications have not escaped me, Linda. It just seemed safe enough at the time. I thought he’d have no choice but to keep quiet. I just didn’t think he’d be stupid enough to think he’d fallen for me. So when he kept coming to see me, I played him along to keep him quiet. It got worse for a while but then I met Bill, and I really was very taken up with him from the moment I met him. I saw Ramsey off the night you and Ken had dinner here and he turned up. He has been pestering me on and off ever since. When I gave Bill a version of what was happening, he was all set to sort him out but I wouldn’t let him. I was scared Ramsey would tell Bill if they were ever alone together. And, I suppose I thought Dave pestering me would just peter out.”

“Had you any idea he would do this?”

“No, none. Not till the message. He’s never threatened suicide. It’s probably the proverbial cry for help. I suppose it is like they say - real suicides never leave a warning. They just kill themselves.”

Linda thinks for a moment, and then says,

“Is there more?”

Susan says nothing whilst she sips her tea. Linda has the distinct impression that her answer, when it comes, will not be not entirely truthful.

“No. I don’t think so. God knows what he has written, though. This could get to the press, you know.”

“It may also come to nothing,” Linda speculates, drawing her thoughts together. “Whatever, you know you have my support. And Ken’s,” she adds, wondering about the truth of that as she says it. “We’ll see you through this. And I’ve no doubt at all that Bill will be there for you. Does he know it was a fling?”

“Well, no, he thinks it was just a love-struck young man chasing a celebrity. And getting nowhere.”

“Oh dear, Linda smiles ruefully. “You mean that he doesn’t know you had an affair? Well, you either tell him the truth right now or you have to bank on him not finding out. I don’t think there is any other choice. What do you think?”

Susan is silent again. She sounds almost exasperated when she speaks.

“I don’t know yet. I haven’t had time to think it through. I’ll sort it out in my head before morning. At the moment, I’m more worried about the job than anything else. Can’t you just see the strap lines in the tabloids? ‘TV Presenter in Sex Romp with Church Minister’. Or, ‘Church Minister Commits Suicide over Affair with Susan Blakely’. You know what that would mean, Linda. Exit Susan Blakely’s career, stage left.”

“I see the ramifications, Susan. I did as soon as you said. But I don’t think it’s time to panic yet. What happens if he survives? What happens publicly, I mean, for you?”

“Probably not a lot. Psychiatrists and social workers will deal with him. I don’t think there will be any further police action. I certainly wouldn’t be pursuing anything like complaints over harassment or anything. As long as the press don’t get hold of the story in terms of any connection to me, the TV bosses won’t find out.”

“And if he dies?”

“A different ball game. There will be a post-mortem. The cause of death will have to be confirmed. The press will publish something. A minister of the church who commits suicide is news by any standard. It would depend on whether the suicide note gets to the press and, of course, what, if anything, it says. The tape won’t – the police assured me of that.”

“So, we can only wait. Or, do you think there’s anything we should do? Should you speak to your boss?”

“I might tell him what I told the police. That keeps the whole thing looking consistent. Anyway, the police could ask questions there, I suppose.” Susan is thinking aloud now. “Yes, I’d better say something, but I’ll do it tomorrow. I’m due to see Jonathon anyway. I’ll not make a big point of it”

“That sounds OK,” Linda reflects. “Needless to say Ken and I will follow that line if asked.”

“Thank you,” is all Susan manages, but Linda knows she means it.

“That leaves Bill,” Linda says, returning to the theme. “You need to think about this sooner rather than later. He might prefer to know now even if, bluntly, you haven’t been honest with him to date. Why weren’t you, by the way? I thought people in new relationships usually shared their pasts, so to speak. Revealing all at the beginning acts as insurance as much as anything nobler. Anyway, it might be better to let him know than for him to find out. What if this nut Dave has written to him, for example?”

“I’ll think about it. I didn’t tell him because I’m not too proud of what was only meant to be a one-night stand that I got trapped by. Real relationships are different for me and he knows about the only other serious relationship I had before him. I saw no point in telling him about Ramsey. He was of no importance.”

“I can see that,” says Linda, doubtfully. “Well, whatever you decide, let me know quickly so that I’ll know how to play it if the three or four of us are together. You may need your friends around you for a few days.”

Susan leans over to touch her friend’s arm, saying that she is relieved at the common-sense approach Linda is taking and that she is glad she decided to call her. Otherwise, she would have worried at the problem and her thoughts would have stayed jumbled without Linda’s objectivity. Linda’s presence has kept her purely practical – this is not the time for inner soul searching.

Linda suspects that there is still more to this but she chooses not to pry. Nor should she, she decides. She will not be judgmental and she needs to be practical, indeed pragmatic, if she is to be of any real help to Susan.

Linda does not stay much longer. It is nearly two and they can hear the first sounds of the early morning city coming to life. It will be dawn soon, Linda thinks, as Susan accompanies her down to the now waiting taxi.

“Thank you, Linda,” she says, giving her a warm and genuine hug of friendship. You can’t know how much you have helped tonight.”

“One day, who knows, you may have to help me, Susan,” Linda says, almost enigmatically, and staying in the hug.

Susan pulls apart and looks at her, a questioning smile on her face. Linda says nothing, smiles back and then, thinking, adds,

“As and when, Susan. Not now and maybe not for a long time. You are the person I would talk to. But that’s not important right now. Try to get some sleep and I’ll be in touch in the day. Let me know as soon as you hear anything yourself. I’ll be at the Department by ten. Goodnight now.”

Once home, Linda hopes for a few hours sleep, slipping quietly in beside Ken who stirs, mutters, “Everything all right?” and goes straight over again as she whispers, “Yes. I’ll tell you tomorrow.”

CHAPTER 4

She wakes at nine to find Ken and the children up and away and to hear the sounds of Tina emptying the dishwasher in the kitchen. She has little time to reflect on the events of the night. She has to deliver a lecture at eleven and wants an hour beforehand at her desk to revise notes and to check her computer presentation before going to the lecture theatre. She is out of the house within thirty minutes, eyes stinging from lack of sleep, but otherwise alert to the day ahead.

As a professor, she has the luxury of secretarial support and, in reality, the young woman is something of a personal assistant to Linda. As soon as she enters her Department, Linda asks her to let her know if her friend Susan Blakely phones and to put her through; but otherwise she is not to be disturbed until after the lecture.

The lecture is reasonably successful – mainly a computerised slide presentation to post-graduate students, all heading to Masters or Doctorates, about the archaeological site in the Hebrides that will be the focus of their visit there for four weeks in the summer recess. What is known is that the site is Iron Age and existed as a village for several hundred years. Taking samples over the summer for carbon dating should establish over how many hundreds of years the site of the village was inhabited. Linda has already established that pre-existing buildings lie beneath the exposed houses, found two years ago. This year’s work should be the last on this site, for the time being at least, and as such, this is their last opportunity to date the village. Resources are finite. It is hoped to complete the painstaking work of inch-by-inch sifting to reveal how many lower lying houses there are, by the end of August. After that, the site will be in-filled, possibly for good.

The class – only ten strong – is enthusiastic. By twelve o’clock, the serious academic content has been covered, and Linda reminds them that there will be a briefing session at two with herself and Jane Gray, the lead lecturer on the dig itself, about practical arrangements for the trip.

Shortly after twelve, she checks with her secretary - Susan has not rung. During the rest of the morning, Linda scans her correspondence, works on her notes for a seminar due at four o’clock with the degree course students and then has a salad lunch in the staff canteen where she talks college politics with several male colleagues from the School of Business Studies. She then seeks out Jane Gray for a pre-meeting on the excavation trip.

She finds the young lecturer, as previously arranged, in Jane’s study, where she has overrun on a tutorial. A young male student is gathering up his files and agreeing the date of their next meeting in the following month. Linda smiles, waits patiently and nods at the obviously infatuated young student as he leaves. Jane grins at Linda as if to say that the young man’s attentions are just an amusing embarrassment.

“Morning,” she finally says to Linda in a warm and expansive manner.

Linda never tires of seeing Jane. The young American is an exuberant personality, so much less restrained than any of the other staff in the Department, and comfortable with the authority between her and Linda. She might have respect for Linda’s senior position and greater academic standing, but Jane is as much at ease in Linda’s company as Linda suspects that she will be with her friends and family. She is also attractive, with her cropped fair hair already greying at the temples. As on every working day, she is casually smart, never in skirts, and always in well-cut trousers and what are clearly expensive shirt blouses. The effect this morning is, as usual, softened with a drop cardigan. Slightly shorter than Linda, she is trim and, Linda has noticed, full busted. Linda suspects that she would not be a great sportswoman.

Jane responds now with an equally warm smile of welcome. A moment passes as they simply stand, allowing the silence to take them into the close professional relationship they share. At thirty-eight, Jane Gray has been with the University for two years. An American from Colorado, she came to the University with a New York Doctorate, originally on a one-year’s tenure. She showed such an aptitude for the field of archaeology and such a warm and effusive personality that she both earned and charmed her way to a permanent post on the academic staff. She has an enthusiasm for the ancient world that now takes her throughout Western Europe at every opportunity. The departmental notice board is laden with postcards from her various visits to Pompeii, Rome, Crete and the south of France. Single, she talks little of her background, except to keep the secretary up to date with news of her folks and brother back home and of her yearly trips back to Colorado to the little village that is home – a village which in reality is a sizeable town by this country’s standards.

“Well, Professor,” she says in half formal, half familiar fashion. “How are you?” Linda watches as Jane looks at her more closely and then says, “Actually, are you tired?”

“Just a bit - a broken night, that’s all,” Linda replies. “But I’m fine. How are you?”

“I’m well. I’m well,” Jane comes back in her lilting American accent. “The term is just running away. I barely get time for my own research. But I am having a good time – this year’s classes are so stimulating.”

“And you are so refreshing,” thinks Linda, “After so much complaining about workloads and pressure from some of the others.”

This is the usual sort of exchange between these two women, who see each other only infrequently for any length of time, the academic terms being actually highly pressurised with teaching, staff meetings and research work, not to mention the hard graft of the student examination cycle.

These few words of greeting lead quickly to the task in hand – a half hour’s discussion on the excavation to take place in the summer. Jane will lead the dig for the first two weeks with Linda joining them for the last two and taking the lead from there. Funding for the project is secured but very restricted and everyone will be staying in a local youth hostel.

This causes a groan from Linda and a sympathetic laugh of agreement from Jane who will be tolerating these conditions, she points out, for twice as long. The good news, Jane advises her, is that the budget will run to meals in pubs a couple of times a week and a last weekend stay in a hotel if each party member makes a small contribution. They agree this would be cheap at the price. A mini-bus will transport them to the island and between the hostel and the site – a daily distance on the island of a thirty-mile round trip.

On their last weekend’s work in August there is, coincidentally, to be a folk festival on the island and there is already, Jane informs Linda, a growing level of enthusiasm amongst the student group about the social as well as the work aspects of the trip.

Linda is quietly impressed with the efficiency of Jane’s preparations. She listens with a supportive smile as Jane fills her in on the rest. Jane will supervise the dig, measuring and photographing the site before going on to log and collect artefacts as they emerge. She will oversee the collection of samples from the earth, the midden and the fireplaces. The cooking troughs should also provide the material for analysis, that the carbon dating process requires. When Linda arrives at the mid point of the dig, she will work more on interpretation with Jane than on the dig itself. Linda will meet with local historians from the museum, with the island’s local authority and with the Tourist Organisation. She will prepare Open Day presentations to encourage local interest. There should also be local press coverage, and, depending on the significance of what is found, national interest.

Jane always has the ability to engage Linda with her enthusiasm and Linda, for whom there is always a certain discomfort about being away from the family for periods in the summer, is soon anticipating the dig with relish. She will enjoy Jane’s company and the work is important. In any case, Ken wants to have time with the kids and to do some camping with them. Ken never complains.

She is feeling comfortable and enthusiastic about the trip as she and Jane progress along the corridor to the meeting with the postgraduate group. They spend an informal hour over coffee mugs, planning the trip and the work ahead. Mercifully, Linda will avoid the tedious mini-bus trip to the island and will fly out to join the team and later will fly back. Jane will be the stalwart, albeit they both know that the men in the party will automatically assume responsibility for driving and all the heavy work. They will also look after the women, Jane especially.

The meeting over, Jane hovers behind with Linda for a few minutes saying how much she is looking forward to August. She seems just a little hesitant as she stands there and Linda waits, knowing that Jane is going to say something else.

It is an invitation. Jane has a supper party later in the week for some women friends – all professional women working in the city. Would Linda be interested in coming along? Linda thinks for a moment before replying. She wants to accept the invitation – she knows it right away. She is interested to know who Jane’s friends are; what the outlooks are of younger professional women these days. And she will not be breaching any University protocols. Something says she should not accept. She is not sure that she would accept if another of her staff invited her without Ken. But then, this is an evening for women.

“I would be delighted,” she says “Provided there are no commitments waiting for me at home with the children.”

Jane leaves with one of her warm smiles – smiles that exude friendliness.

Linda smiles in farewell; aware too, that she enjoys this woman’s company and that this is one colleague who somehow brings life to the department.

It is six o’clock when she gets back to the house and there is still no call from Susan. An hour of talk and attention to the children passes before she is free to leave them to their homework and to head upstairs for a shower. Ken will be late - a busy surgery will delay him. Glass of red wine in hand, she sits on the edge of the bed and rings Susan. She gets the answer phone but knows she would.

“Susan? It’s me.”

The phone is lifted right away. She is relieved to hear her friend’s voice.

“Hi.”

“Are you OK? Have you heard anything?”

“Yes I’m fine. And yes, I have heard. Ramsey is still alive. I heard half an hour ago. I was on the way to ring you.”

“Well, thank God for that,” Linda exclaims in relief.

“It’s not as simple as that. Apparently he did take paracetemol. It was a pretty heavy amount. So there may well be liver damage. All they will say to me is that he is stable at the moment.”

“How did you hear? Did you contact the hospital? Will he survive?” The questions tumble out, despite herself.

“I don’t know if he will survive. I eventually rang the hospital just now. It seemed a reasonable thing to do if you have received a suicide call and know the man’s in hospital, overdosed. You would, wouldn’t you? Mind you, it took me all day to make up my mind.”

“So it’s a question of waiting,” observes Linda. “What happened at work?”

“Nothing really. I saw the boss about ten. That’s our routine slot. Anyway, as I was leaving, I told Jonathon about the police coming and the answer phone message, then about Ramsey being in hospital. I said I didn’t think there would be much in it but that I thought that he should know.”

“What did he say? Did you say anything about you and Ramsey?”

“No, nothing, except that Mike and I had drinks with him and I thought then he might have had a bit of a crush on me, so to speak. I said it was all a bit difficult - laid it on a bit about his poor wife and what a sad thing for a Minister to do.”

“That sounds OK,” Linda reflects quickly. “And what did he say?”

“Well, basically he said not to worry but to keep him posted, and if there was a story, they would handle it at company level. Which was fine, but I did think he gave me rather a long look as I was leaving – you know how it is when you think that someone is weighing you up”.

Linda laughs.

“Well, that is his job, Susan. You are amongst the professionals when it comes to enquiry, you know. Just go with it. They need you and they don’t need trouble. It sounds OK to me.”

“Thanks Linda. I can’t thank you enough for last night. It was good to be able to talk it through.”

“No problem, honestly,” Linda assures her friend, thinking that there is a lot more to talk through, as and when Susan is ready. “Have you decided what to say to Bill?” she ventures.

“I’ll play it by ear. I’ll have to give him something of the truth – maybe that I led Ramsey on a bit. But I can’t tell him about the affair – not yet anyway.”

“All right. I’ve said nothing to Ken yet, and I’ll say as little as possible. But, Susan, you know I don’t lie to him. I’ll just bank on him not asking too many questions.”

Susan has to accept this. She would not ask Linda to compromise herself.

“What about the police?” Linda continues. “Have you heard anything?”

“No, nothing. Presumably, whilst Dave is alive, I won’t.”

“No. Probably not.”

Susan pauses on the line and Linda hears her answer the doorbell via the intercom.

“That’s friends arriving for a drink.”

“OK. Just don’t forget where I am. Let me know how it goes. And Linda – I’ll be thinking of you.”

Putting the phone down, Linda sits for a few moments, reflecting. What she does not see yet is why Susan has not told Bill about this Ramsey chap – new lovers tend to tell each other about previous serious, and not so serious, relationships. She supposes it will now be doubly hard for Susan to say much at this point. But, she thinks, her friend is taking a big risk. Bill could react badly if he finds out in the event of Ramsey’s death. And if he finds out through adverse publicity, that will be a disaster. Still, Susan must have her reasons for her decision. Linda certainly knows only too well, from her own experience, that silence can be the best policy.

And, she concludes, if Susan decides to conceal the truth from Linda she will just have to respect that. Ken need know nothing. After all, Susan is her friend; not Ken’s

CHAPTER 5

She has to break cover and see Dave Ramsey. She has to see for herself what state he is in; what he is saying; what his wife knows and is thinking. Her reputation could depend on it.

These last two days have seemed interminable. Susan knows now that Ramsey has survived but she knows no more than that. She rings the hospital from time to time, always choosing a different time from the previous call so that the shifts are different, and so that she will be speaking to a new nurse.

She is a friend of the Ramseys, she says on each occasion, and she is enquiring after Dave. She knows the situation, of course. Eventually, after two days of this she asks if it is possible to visit. She promises that she will only stay for a few moments.

It is that easy. Several hours later, she tiptoes almost, to the little single room opposite the nurses’ station and to Dave’s bedside. She takes in the scene at a glance. She recognises Brenda who is sitting with her back to her, mousy-coloured hair straggling and shoulders stooped, dressed in a grey skirt and pink sweater – clothes that could only be described as drab and unflattering. She is a short, plump woman, perhaps in her late twenties or very early thirties. Dave is asleep or sedated or both. And he is almost unrecognisable, strapped to tubes and machines and nearly as white as his hospital gown. Always a gaunt man, he now looks cadaverous.

“Brenda? Hello. Do you remember me?”

Brenda looks round, startled and with momentarily unseeing eyes. Her cheeks are sunken, her face grey. For a fleeting moment, Susan feels sorry for her. But it is only fleeting. Susan is here to protect Susan.

Brenda clearly does remember her now – they all saw each other on a number of occasions. Susan always suspected when she met them in the street that Dave used their husband and wife shopping mornings as an excuse to bump into Susan. Poor, sad, Brenda – she was always none the wiser about her husband’s ploys.

Brenda smiles at Susan and there is an unspoken question in her expression as to why Susan, a big TV personality, is here.

“Miss Blakely – how nice of you to come here.”

Susan replies, using her professional role and taking an enormous gamble in doing so.

“I wanted to see you both. Dave was so nice when I interviewed him on television a couple of years ago. We hear about things, you know, at the TV centre. I heard about this yesterday.” Susan is sweeping her hand round the room as she speaks, taking in the patient and the equipment in her explanatory gesture. “When I heard, I just had to come and see if there is anything I can do. What happened, Brenda, Do you know?”

As she whispers all this, Susan indicates a chair and asks with her expression whether she can sit by Brenda. Brenda nods, obviously glad to have someone to talk to. Susan is a skilled interviewer and she is about to put her ability to show compassion and concern to work to draw out Brenda’s knowledge of what happened.

“I don’t really know too much yet, Miss Blakely. Dave has been in and out of sleep and unconsciousness for days now. There are always medical things going on. There’s been no real chance to talk.”

Tears are welling in Brenda’s eyes as she looks away from Susan to her husband.

“This must be a nightmare beyond your worst imaginings, Brenda. How did you hear the news?” Susan prompts her. As she does so, she stretches over and holds Brenda’s hand for a moment.

Brenda begins to tell the story of the night she heard about the suicide attempt, as if reliving it, like people who have been traumatised often need to do. This is now bread and butter interviewing for Susan.

“It was the police who came to my door. I had gone to bed. I was a bit worried that Dave was not home when I got back from my parents’ house – I go over there every week. I just thought that he was late from being at the soup run for the church. But when it got to eleven and he still wasn’t home, I decided to sleep a bit and to ring the homeless shelter if he wasn’t home by one. But I fell asleep and the bell woke me.” She pauses. “ I should never have gone to bed.”

Brenda is speaking to herself now. Susan lets her gather her thoughts and the young woman continues with her story.

“Dave was still not beside me. I knew then that something was wrong. I just hoped that it was Dave at the door. Maybe his keys were lost or even stolen. But I heard the policewoman’s voice. The policewoman checked and checked again that I was Brenda Ramsey. I knew then that something was seriously wrong.

“Is it Dave? What’s happened? Is he hurt? Has there been an accident? They didn’t answer right away. They asked if they could come in. They said they did have some bad news. The policewoman and the sergeant brought me into the sitting room. I think I was already in a bit of shock then, Miss Blakely.”

Susan is struck by the verbatim, flat toned account coming from Brenda. Is she still in deep shock or mentally unwell?

“Call me Susan, Brenda. What happened then?”

Brenda picks up on her staccato account. Susan knows that she is getting the whole picture now and just hopes that no one comes into the room and breaks Brenda’s flow of concentration.

“They told me that Dave was in hospital – his condition was serious. It wasn’t an accident, though. He appeared to have taken an overdose. I just looked at the officers, Miss Blakely. I was too stunned to say anything. I sort of came to slowly and I heard the policewoman asking me if I had someone, a relative perhaps, whom they could call for me. But my first reaction was to deal with this on my own. I don’t know why really. The questions began to tumble into my head. How? Why? How is he? Where is he now?”

Brenda pauses and looks at Susan as if for some confirmation that she understands. Susan smiles gently.

“Then I asked them if he was going to be all right. They told me that he was in intensive care in the liver unit here at the City General. They offered to bring me here as soon as I felt ready. Miss Blakely, I could hardly take it in. They said that he took paracetemol but no one knows why. He was found in his car and taken to hospital about two hours after they think he took the pills”

Brenda breaks off from her monologue and then turns to speak directly to Susan.

“Paracetemol? I was surprised at the time, Miss Blakely. I thought that wasn’t serious. I thought that paracetemol was just like aspirin,”

She looks at Susan as if to say ‘How could I have been so stupid?’ For a moment, Susan feels genuinely sorry for her.

“Brenda, there are lots of things we don’t know till something like this happens and it affects us directly.”

Brenda gives her a sad smile.

“Well, anyway, they told me that I’d have to speak to the doctors about that but that he did take a lot and there could be complications. They asked me whether I had any idea why my husband wanted to do this? Did he give me any warning?”

A frisson runs through Susan as she waits for this question to be answered. This is one of her own main questions for Brenda; her main reason for being here. Brenda looks at her now.

“I don’t know, Miss Blakely. He has so much to live for.”

Susan feels relief go through her but gives no indication of this to the other woman. Thank God, though – Brenda has no idea about her affair with Dave.

“There was a letter, Miss Blakely.”

Susan freezes. Brenda continues, oblivious to the tension in Susan.

“The police sergeant saw the letter first. It was lying on a small coffee table by one of our armchairs. He went over and picked it up. I hadn’t noticed it in the dark. And I didn’t see it before I went to bed. Perhaps if I had …”

Susan shakes her head.

“It sounds from what you have said as though they could not have found Dave any more quickly than they did.” She does not know whether this is true or not but it might keep Brenda on track for what Susan needs next.

“Brenda, would it be possible to see the letter?” Susan is gentle.

Brenda hesitates and Susan jumps in to seem apologetic.

“I’m are only trying to help, Brenda. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to interfere.”

“The police have it. But I remember what it said. He said he was going away on a journey. He said there are some things – sins - he has done that fill him with shame. He says that, more than anything, he wants me to go on and have a happier life than I could have if he were here. There was more about the church and God, but that’s what I remember most.” Brenda gives a sob as she chokes back tears.

Susan looks at the ashen-faced young woman whose simple world has changed forever.

“Brenda, do you know what sins Dave was talking about?” Her tone is solicitous.

“No.” This is said quietly but emphatically. Susan lets the matter rest.

“What happened next?”

Brenda goes on with her account. The policewoman accompanied Brenda to the relatives’ waiting room on the ward and she sat with Brenda while nurses brought tea and told them that the doctor would be with them as soon as possible. It was dawn when a junior houseman, no older than Brenda herself, came in and sat down opposite her. The doctor’s name, apparently, was Doctor Semple. He treated Dave from his admission onwards. He said that Dave was as comfortable as they could make him. Brenda’s main question was, ‘Will he be all right?’

Doctor Semple told Brenda that paracetemol and some anti-depressants had been washed out of his system, although he was quite deeply unconscious when he was admitted. He regained consciousness but he was very drowsy and really continued to be very unwell. Brenda’s first reaction to what doctor Semple told her was that Dave would now be all right since they got the pills out of his stomach.

“Apparently, with paracetemol it’s much more serious than that. Depending on the amount of the dose, paracetemol can lead to liver failure.” Brenda just looks at Susan as she says this. She is clearly overwhelmed by this and not understanding how that could be. “The doctor suggested that it was not certain, but that it could be irreversible.”

Brenda stares at Susan, still getting herself accustomed to the idea.

“He could die - from headache pills?” Brenda blurts out the question.

Susan responds quietly.

“I believe there is that possibility, yes. I understand that people do use it as a way of committing suicide.”

But Brenda is clinging now to hope.

“They told me a that there are a number of things they can do in intensive liver care. There are the treatments that they usually use, like dialysis. These may not be successful though. Now there is also a new treatment that might save him. They are trying this, Susan, but it will be several days before we know whether he’s going to make it.”

She has finally used Susan’s name, and as far as an interview is concerned this is a good indication to Susan that Brenda is trusting her and relaxing with her. And so far, Susan has heard nothing to implicate herself in the reason for Dave’s actions. Nothing, so far, is traceable back to her.

“What about a liver transplant?” She now asks. “is that a possibility?”

Brenda hesitates.

“They say that Dave would not be a priority – not after a suicide attempt.” Brenda braces herself. “He could die.”

They both stop to look in silence at the person in the bed, Brenda with her thoughts, Susan with the sense of fear that comes when events outside one’s own control may have a negative impact on one’s life. Brenda is speaking again.

“It is possible. And it won’t be immediate. They say that he will be lucid, certainly at first, and able to talk to me. They have allowed me to stay with him. I have a fold down bed in here.”

Poor woman, Susan thinks, genuinely sympathetic; even if only momentarily. How do you begin to grasp all this?

“If he lives,” Brenda asks, “What will happen?”

Susan is not prepared for the question. This changes the talk they are having from one where she is a sympathetic listener to one where she is being asked for semi-professional advice. She gathers her thoughts.

“Well, you are bound to be asked what you think might have caused this. The doctors here and the social workers will want to work out how best to help him. There’s the medical side but there is also the longer-term recovery and treatment side. Presuming the best happens and he pulls through, his mental well-being will take some time to recover, Brenda.”

“Is he mad?” Brenda asks, hearing Susan’s reference, ‘mental’

“I don’t think so,” Susan replies in all honesty. “Not in the way that I think you mean. But he is probably very depressed and distressed to have done this. The people here will help. And they know a great deal more about these things than we do.”

“What should I say to him?”

Susan reflects the question back to Brenda.

“What would you like to say to him?”

Brenda sits thinking.

“Just that I want him to live.”

“Then say that.”

Susan knows it is time to leave. As she gives Brenda another squeeze of the hand, a pleasant nurse with an air of efficiency comes into the room from behind the desk to greet her. She must have been aware that there was a deep conversation happening and waited for the signs of it coming to an end.

“Hello, Brenda. How are you doing?”

Brenda smiles at the nurse before introducing Susan.

“Miss Blakely, this is Staff Nurse Jones. Judy is Dave’s special.”

Susan takes her opportunity.

“I’m a friend of the Reverend and Mrs Ramsey. I just called in to see if there is anything I can do to help.”

Brenda turns to the nurse, quite comfortable now in Susan’s company.

“Will he live?” Brenda pushes her.

The nurse looks at her and then at Susan.

“We don’t know yet, Brenda. I was talking to the doctor this morning and there are definitely signs of liver failure. I believe you know this?”

Brenda looks at her, hearing the full implications.

“How long will it be before we know, one way or the other?”

“He could survive, Brenda. There is a possibility. As you know, the doctors are trying this new treatment. It is a drug called N-acetylcysteine. It has been found to increase the chances of survival. It is going to be touch and go for a number of days. This will be a hard time for you and for Dave. I’m afraid it will be very hard indeed, not knowing how things will turn out.”

“Dave knows he could die,” says Brenda, half as statement, half as question.

“Yes …yes, he does. I spent a little time with him last night. We talked about the possibility of him living too, of course. He is groggy but I understand he talked with a minister this morning?” As Staff Nurse Jones says this, she looks at Brenda to see whether she is going to be forthcoming. Brenda says nothing; just nods.

There is little more for Susan to glean for now.

And from the bed there is the sign of Dave moving and beginning to waken. She does not want to see him and, more particularly, does not want Dave to see her. She might have been worried enough to break cover this morning but it is working to her advantage to let Brenda lean on her without Dave’s knowledge.

She takes her leave, asking Brenda if she can ring to see how things are. Brenda is glad of the offer – grateful in a rather sad, subservient way. Susan moves out to the nurses’ station with Staff Nurse Jones. They chat quietly, the staff nurse saying that she recognized Susan from the TV. Is she here officially? “Oh no,” Susan assures her – she met Dave through one of her chat shows and just wanted to be sure that he and Brenda were all right. She half listens to the nurse’s account of the treatment Dave is receiving, standing quietly by the desk. When a bell rings, the Staff Nurse excuses herself to go to another patient.

Susan watches through the open door to Dave’s room as Brenda, back towards her, leans to be close to Dave. There they are, husband and wife, separated by white patient gown, medical equipment and Dave’s dark, hollow eyes and yellowed complexion.

He is dozing and wakes as she moves to the bedside. Brenda manages to take his hand.

“Hello,” he mutters.

“Oh, Dave,” is all she manages to say.

“I’m sorry, Brenda.”

“Don’t be. You’ll get better.”

“No. I’m sorry I messed it up. I should have gone.”

She cannot grasp this. Susan can see that from the way Brenda reels back from the bed. She watches this little personal drama unfold in voyeuristic curiosity.

“Dave, it will be all right, no matter what. Just get well.”

He smiles, squeezes her hand and drifts off.

Susan leaves before Brenda knows she has been listening. One thought only occurs to her as she stands in the lift. She has not had the slightest awareness of the patient as a former lover – just as a possible threat to herself. He is a threat whether he talks or dies. She feels sorry for the wife; that is all. But she is not responsible for Dave Ramsey’s suicide attempt. He and he alone is responsible. It looks as though he said nothing to Brenda, or a confession would have been in the suicide note. That is good news.

“Let’s just hope he survives and continues to keep his mouth shut,” is her final thought before the rest of her day takes over her attentions.

She taxies to her office where plans for the afternoon programme occupy her till it is time to go on air. Today’s live show is pretty banal by Susan’s standards – there is nothing in her sphere of interest happening at the moment in the public domain, so the programme will be taken from her team’s pull-down menu of fill-in subjects. The one chosen is about people who inherited or won fortunes and then blew them and were left impoverished. It simply is not her cup of tea but she still manages to engender what the producer is looking for – a mixture of pity and derision in the audience, people not fortunate enough to have had money in the first place.

No matter how many times Susan appears on television, she is left on an adrenalin high after a show. It is always a job well done and, for her, a dramatic presentation. She has an ability to capture and hold an audience, to draw people’s feelings out and then to summarise and pull things together in a way that no communication to her earpiece from a producer can better. Then the debrief after a show and the beginning preparations for the next week always help her to make the transition from work to leisure that ensures that the separation between her private and her professional life is a reality.

Tonight is Bill’s return from his conference and she is keen to be away to the supermarket and to do the preparations, even though he is not due till eight.

She still has only an hour to prepare by the time she enters her flat. She puts on background lighting and music, closes curtains and puts the oven on. She has a quick look round to make sure that the stylish rooms are neat and tidy. Even TV presenters need to cook and clean, she argued to Bill on the occasions when he thought that she was fussing about such matters. She would not have a cleaner – a notion she would not tolerate. Principled modern women do not have other, poorly paid women doing personal chores for them. In some matters, she wants her professional image to be reflected in her private life. She has not yet been interviewed for a magazine profile but it can only be a matter of time. Left to herself, she would have a cleaner every day. Only professional interests in her private life preclude that.

She puts the finishing touches to the food preparations, reflecting on the day as she works. She decides that it is only fair to keep Linda up to date on what is happening. She almost regrets telling her friend about Ramsey – the little she told her. It looks more and more as if the danger of her exposure is receding.

But Linda is a stalwart friend – she knows that. She is solid and safe to speak with and, best of all, sensible. If there is something that she is missing in her interpretation of her visit to the hospital, Linda will see it.

It is not a good time to be ringing a mother at home after a heavy day at work. But Linda, give her her due, listens carefully, obviously walking off, phone in hand, to somewhere in the house that is out of family earshot.

Linda recaps.

“So – he is still in danger but hanging on; he has left a note that says nothing; he is still suicidal or at least regrets not being dead. Brenda talked easily to you and Dave did not know you were there.”

“Yes, that’s about it. What do you think?”

Linda thinks for a moment before replying.

“Well, it does look as though it’s going to be all right. But I’m not sure that it would be wise to go back to the hospital, even if Brenda did say that she would like you to keep in touch. There are other ways to keep an ear to the ground.”

Susan listens, perfectly aware of her own tendency to fly too close to the wind. She has to take heed of the advice.

They talk for a very short while after that, Susan promising to mention to Bill the invitation to lunch with the whole Pilar family. She knows that he would have preferred a dinner invitation, and adults only. In that, they share a common view on children.

As she showers and finds casual evening clothes, Susan’s thoughts turn to Bill, the man who has given her the opportunity to bring security to her personal future and who would be the perfect match for her continuing professional career.

Susan has actually missed her partner since his departure on Monday for the prestigious golf hotel down the west coast where a three-day conference was being held. For those days, Susan knows that he entered the different world of dignified receptions, addresses and seminars, and dinners with witty speeches. Susan has attended and reported on many such conferences in her earlier days as a newspaper reporter.

Bill Nicolson enjoys this annual conference and, having attended five now, he is a well-recognized and respected figure in the legal establishment. He entered a legal firm in the city as a newly qualified solicitor where he undertook the usual foot-soldiering activity of preparing wills, negotiating contentious insurance claims and buying and selling houses for clients. It was a very general induction to his trade. That was eighteen years ago.

Susan now knows a fair amount about her current partner. She knows a great deal more about him than he knows about her. Apart from the early attraction for him that she felt, she knew that she had a dark past that she needed to bury. She thought at first that Bill would be a perfect husband for that reason alone. He would also be the perfect smoke screen to obliterate her earlier life.

For Bill is now pre-eminent in the city, specialising in civil law and with a staff team of at least a dozen juniors and a partner. And she likes Bill’s legal partner. He is the background boy to Bill’s professional charm. He could never outshine Bill. That is partly why she likes him. Alistair Berry and Bill were fortunate in hitting on a niche in the legal market at a time when business was expanding and the city was affluent. Their success has also been the product of serious hard work, judicious networking and a not inconsiderable amount of entertaining of selected clients. Bill and his professional status in the city and beyond would, Susan thought at first, be a perfect match to fit her public profile.

Yet Susan moves across circles he will never know – and even if she does not belong to any one circle in particular, she is at ease with the wealthy, with politicians, with business leaders and with royalty – if the latter matters. Bill says that he likes all that self-assured independence in her. There is classlessness to her role, though, that for a while Susan thought would be tempered by a suitable marriage.

A year into their relationship, he said that he wanted them to marry. He had already suggested that they should move in together and was hoping the answer would be ‘yes’. He had no thoughts of a stay-at-home wife. He did not need one, he said, having lived a comfortable existence for many years. He could cook, when he chose to, had, Susan considered, impeccable taste in smart and leisure wear and had filled his flat with fine Victorian furniture and art. His secretary looked after all his practical and financial domestic matters for which she received a handsome bonus each Christmas. He was happy for his lifestyle to continue in this vein with Susan fitting in to the home that they would adjust, he thought, to suit her more feminine taste. He wanted Susan to continue her professional life – it was so very much a central part of her - and he could not imagine it otherwise. What he wanted was to be married to her, to sleep with her each night and to build together on their existing professional and social lives. He loved her and admired her for the person she was. To ask more of her, to have children and to tie her down would be to spoil what he felt was the essence of the person she was. Her freedom would also be his freedom. Without her, though, his freedom was increasingly becoming a lonely place.

He should have been the man she was waiting for – the man who could give her permanence and respectability and full freedom to pursue her career. But when the proposal came, she stalled. And she has been stalling ever since. Now Bill has gone back to pushing for her to at least move in with him.

She is dressed just in time. The doorbell rings at the outer door. Susan releases the security lock and he is there, flowers in hand, a distinguished, pinstriped and slim man, dark and handsome in a conventional, clean-cut sort of way. It is good to see him. She has to acknowledge that to herself. She just wishes that she could feel again that charge of passion she knew before they settled into the regularity of their meetings. But Bill knows nothing of these thoughts. Susan intends him to have a good evening. She has to keep him on board right now.

Much later, as they lie in bed, the sheets in disarray and naked together after what Susan thinks is now very familiar, maybe slightly disappointing lovemaking, he says that he is more than ever convinced that this is what he wants. Now she wishes she was not quite so receptive to him earlier on. She was warm and kind and settled him with white wine whilst she prepared a supper of fresh salmon steaks, fresh hollandaise sauce from the chain store and baby vegetables. It was not a culinary masterpiece but it was clean and simple after days of hotel conference catering. It was a good evening for them both and she suggested that he should take a bath and she would clear away. She joined him in due course and she sat on the bath edge whilst he soaked, talking with him about the conference and asking the questions of a skilled interviewer. She made him think, which he clearly enjoyed.

She kept her account of her day’s events light – nothing much had happened on the news front and that chap Ramsey - she mentioned him once, didn’t she? - was in hospital now. Apparently he took an overdose. The police let her know and they took a taped message the weirdo left on her phone.

Bill asked, abstractedly, if she would hear any more about it and she thought not. As she recounted this, Susan was also running the sponge over the inside of his legs – a distraction that took them to bed shortly afterwards.

When she wakes in the morning, Bill is gone – off, no doubt to his own flat to unpack and change before going to his office. By her pillow is one of the roses from the bouquet he brought her and a note that says, simply, “I love you”. She is part amused, part irritated.

She is eating cereals and toast and reading the morning paper when the phone rings. Immediately, she knows who it will be. It is Brenda Ramsey. Right now Susan does not want to hear this voice, the advice from Linda ringing still in her ears. This is an untimely reminder of trouble that could still be in store for her. It is also too soon after the hospital visit.

“Miss Blakely? Susan, I mean? I’m sorry to ring you, but I wondered if I could meet you for coffee or something. I’d like to talk to someone who is not involved.”

Susan thinks for a moment, keeping Brenda on hold by saying that it is good to hear her and how is Dave? Do they have relatives who could help?

Brenda sounds put off, and is about to ring off with an apology. Susan’s instincts kick in. Of course, she will meet Brenda – it is the least she can do, having offered to help. Would eleven at the Café Noir suit?

Brenda is there on time, and surprised that Brenda is late. She knows soon enough why. She flusters to the table, slumps into a chair, and tears well in her eyes.

“He’s slipping away. I think he’s going to die.”

Susan calms her, not sure whether it would not be for the best if that happens. She pours her some coffee and says,

“Tell me what’s happened, Brenda.”

After her call to Susan, Brenda went back in to sit with Dave till it was time to leave for the Café Noir. The monitoring machines over Dave’s bed went off about an hour ago. Dave’s breathing, Brenda realized, was laboured and lights were flashing on a console above him. Nurses came past her, one either side of the bed, and were reaching for oxygen mask, removing pillows, all calmly but quickly. Then a third nurse asked Brenda to wait in the visitors’ room till the doctor came and they got Dave stabilised again.

Brenda was once more in the visitors’ room, not knowing whether her husband would live or die. Minutes later, Doctor Semple advised her that Dave was suffering from inflammation of the brain, that his condition had deteriorated and it would now be a question of waiting to see what, if any, effect the drug would have. When Brenda went into the room again he was laying flat, oxygen mask over his face. A nurse was by his bed, and he appeared to Brenda to be unconscious. They told her that she should prepare herself for the worst. It would be days – but it could be the end.

Whatever Brenda was going to talk to Susan about is now lost in the immediacy of Dave’s critical state. Susan looks at Brenda, a child almost, and possibly about to experience the worst that a young wife can. She is here, but she is lost in the immediate reaction to seeing her husband deteriorate in front of her eyes. Neither Susan nor Brenda can do anything but wait.

CHAPTER 6

Still at the age when a mother’s attention is all, Angela is giving an animated account of the afternoon’s classes to Linda. Tina is baking and listening in the background. The class had a talk on drugs from a community policeman and woman, and Angela is now full of what nice people they were. She has less to say about the subject material. The notion of taking drugs is, mercifully, beyond her sphere of reality. Linda sits at the table, silently praying that it will stay that way for both of her children.

Home early for once, but with an hour’s work still to do at the computer for the next day, Linda is enjoying her daughter as much as Angela is enjoying her mother. She never fails to feel that surge of painful love when she looks at Angela’s dark eyes, her features those of her Latinate background. Both children are dark – bushy eyebrows, brown eyes, skins always a deep shade, especially when they have been exposed to the Spanish sun. The children are a combination of Ken’s North of Spain origins and Linda’s dark complexion. It seems that her children are destined to be beautiful young adults.

Tina is preparing supper for the three of them. Ken will be speaking this evening to a medical symposium being held in the city at one of the better hotels. This is something he hates doing, but he has drawn the short straw at the medical centre. Kenny is out at his friend, Joey’s, where they are celebrating Joey’s birthday.

Sitting with a cup of tea and listening to Angela, Linda is also musing on just how lucky she is in her children. Yes, of course it is the product of their love and the stability they have given them, but each child has such an outgoing personality – that has to be simply the people they were born to be. Tina sees her expression and when Angela wanders off to the TV lounge a few minutes later she takes an opportunity to make a rare comment.

“It’s lovely, the way Angela is turning out.”

Linda smiles, surprising herself by being momentarily choked.

The three of them eat towards six at the kitchen table. Linda snacks only, on pate and toast. Tonight, she is having supper over at Jane Gray’s. Half way through the meal, the phone rings. It is Susan.

Linda listens with some degree of surprise, and perhaps a touch of irritation that Susan is getting herself further and further enmeshed. She turns the surprise into a question.

“Why did you agree to see her?” She says it quietly, trying to indicate that she is not passing judgement, even if she is.

Slowly, it is firming up in Linda’s mind that there is much more to all this than Susan has indicated so far. Susan’s answer is evasive – Linda knows it at once.

“I just thought that she could do with a chat. And then by the time she arrived at the café, Ramsey had gone into a coma.”

An old maxim comes back to Linda. Never believe the word ‘just’.

“Is there any more news about his condition?”

“No. Linda, I was thinking about going round to the hospital. There’s nothing else on this evening and …”

“Susan, is that wise?”

There is a silence. Linda fills it.

“Susan, don’t you think it would help if you told me what’s going on? You’re not in love with this man, are you?” She asks, knowing somehow that the answer is ‘no’, but that there is some deeper liaison here between Susan and Ramsey that has yet to be explained.

“Dear God, no.” There is a pause, and then Susan goes on, “it’s difficult, Linda.”

“So I gather. But why not come round here for a glass of wine? We can think about you going to the hospital later. I’m going out at about eight but we can sit in the sitting room. Ken is working late.”

As she speaks, she gives a non-verbal apology to Angela and Tina, and her daughter screws up her face in half-mock, half-real disappointment.

Linda hears Susan’s semi-reluctant agreement and turns to Angela as she puts the phone down with,

“Never mind, Darling. You’ve got homework tonight anyway. And it’s ages since you saw Aunt Susan. Come and talk to me while I change.”

Angela prattles away happily enough, delighted to have her mother to herself for a little while longer as Linda changes into black trousers, black shirt and belt. ‘Cool’, is the verdict from the child and Linda is quite pleased herself as she offsets the outfit with flat shoes and chunky silver jewellery.

The doorbell and the sound of Tina welcoming Susan take mother and daughter downstairs, Susan holding her arms out to Angela as they descend. Linda always thinks that Susan protests too much about not wanting children. She has been a real aunt figure to the children over the years. Tonight, as always, there is something small for each of them, a book for Angela and a magazine on rugby for Kenny.

Susan dismisses her kindness to the children as Linda thanks her and as they walk through to the sitting room, wine glasses in hand.

“Right, Susan, let’s hear what all this is about.” Linda is gentle but time is short, and she knows that Susan will need straightforward encouragement to say what is going on.

She watches as Susan takes some wine and sets the glass down beside her. Her friend composes herself into what is obviously going to be a difficult conversation for her. But Linda knows that Susan would not be here if she was not prepared to talk. It is just uncomfortable, that is all.

“I don’t want Ken to hear any of this,” Susan prevaricates.

“Of course.” Linda waves away the idea and says no more.

“The situation with Dave Ramsey was more complicated than I led you to believe. I’ve told no one, Linda.” Linda still waits.

“Dave Ramsey and I met three years ago. Do you remember there was a boating tragedy off the island of Mull on the west coast of Scotland?”

Linda shakes her head. It means nothing to her. Susan explains.

“Well, there was a big accident involving a sailing school three summers ago. Actually, I think you were in Spain all that summer, now that I think about it. Dave Ramsey was on a retreat to the island at the time and he was staying in the house of the local minister when it all happened.”

Linda sits patiently, wondering what it was that happened and knowing that just keeping quiet is the best way to move this story along.

“Dave was the holiday relief minister. The sailing school of young teenagers were caught broadsides by a westerly wind. Two boats capsized and the rest went out of control. Only the instructor’s boat was under control. Two people died – a young girl and a lad. By the time the party landed on Mull, a full-scale civil incident had been declared. The lifeboat was launched, ambulances were turned out; the hospital and the local authority were standing by. It was as big a tragedy as the island had ever seen.”

Susan watches as Linda stops speaking.

“Go on,” Linda encourages her. She suspects she knows what is coming. “What’s

the connection with you in all this?” She tries to sound patient but Susan is putting off

getting to the point. Susan gives her an apologetic smile.

“Sorry, Linda. I’m getting there. Anyway, the story ran for days. In the end it was Dave who was given the accolades for his work in supporting the bereaved and the party members. I decided to interview him after the tragedy. It was right up the street of the programme. You know, grief, hate and blame – all that stuff. So I got in touch with him and asked him to come over to the city to do a live show. The bastard refused, would you believe? That doesn’t happen too often, I can tell you. I wanted to cover the whole issue of post-traumatic stress and whether counselling is helpful or not. There was a lot going on about that at the time and he seemed the perfect, instant recent expert. So I agreed with the boss that Mike Moss and I would fly up to Mull. You know Mike. He’s one of the cameramen.”

“Susan, this is a long way to tell me you had a fling with someone.” Linda cannot see why Susan is prevaricating so much.

“Well, I know, but it was more about how it happened that made it so difficult afterwards.”

“Go on.” Linda resists glancing at the clock.

“I first saw Dave Ramsey in the church. He was in his vestments and leading the memorial service for the community and the bereaved. I have to say, I was quite taken with him right away. ‘Forbidden fruit’ and all that, I suppose. I thought he was ruggedly attractive. I realized that he was also watching me intently though at that point he was unaware of how influential I can be or that I was about to make him the personality of the tragedy.”

“Love at first sight?” Linda asks, knowing the answer is ‘no’.

“Lust, more like,” Susan comes back with a rueful expression of after-the-event regret.

“I set Mike filming and I stood till the church emptied before approaching him.

He agreed to see me later and at the manse, in his study.”

Linda raises an eyebrow at this.

“I took Mike with me,” Susan protests. “It was ten o’clock before Mike and I got there and I think Dave had forgotten the appointment in the strain of being with people in shock and grief. He was sitting over a whisky with stress written all over him. I think I decided to seduce him at that moment.”

“You seduced him?” Linda queries in surprise, the whole Dave Ramsey situation as she understood it till now turning on its axis.

“Mm. I’m afraid so. It was easy enough, actually – boringly easy. I was wearing an

ankle-length skirt with a slit up to well above the knee and a plunging open neckline on a cream silk blouse. I saw him looking”

“But Mike was there.”

“Yes. And he was also in hot pursuit of me on the island at the same time. So he was watching me like a hawk, I can tell you. Anyway, I got through the interview and Dave asked us to stay for a drink and sandwiches and as we were leaving he asked us both to come back the next evening if we were still on the island.”

“Let me guess. You went back on your own?”

“Yes. Whilst we were there, it must have been clear to Mike that something was going on. I’d said something to Dave about his gaucheness being vaguely alluring. Mike stomped off to the loo, I remember, a few minutes later. I think he also overheard me saying something about Dave’s physique – it’s more like a sportsman’s body than how you would imagine a churchman’s to be. And Mike was teasing me later, on the way back to the hotel. He thought a minister would hardly be worth the effort of the conquest.”

“I’m not surprised, Susan.” Linda is almost amused at the scene and she laughs as she says this. The notion of Susan being the initiator intrigues her.

“I met him in the street the next day and he invited me for supper. He did not mention Mike.”

“So he was a willing party, then.”

“I suppose so, but there was a fair amount of Dutch courage and pretending to be the perfect churchman before it happened. I asked all the questions. Married? Yes. Good marriage? Yes. Fine. I knew at once it wasn’t. He would not have been there in that room if his marriage were OK. Any affairs? No, of course not – he was a minister. “Until now.” I landed the words as a statement, not as a question. He said nothing, brought brandy to the table and repeated only that he was a minister. I suggested going to the study to drink the brandy and to watch the sun go down.”

“He was as easy as that to seduce?”

“Yes.”

“Well, tell me. How did you do it?” Linda feels some sort of prurient interest as she asks. Defrocking a minister has piquancy to it in any culture.

“I simply stood beside him and undid his belt, then slipped my hand down over his crotch. I undressed in front of him. The rest, as they say, Linda, is history.”

Linda almost wishes she had not asked She is genuinely shocked. She had no thought till now of Susan being the instigator of a sexual encounter or of being so cold headed about it. This is an evening of surprises.

“It was absolutely my conquest. And I made it happen twice, three times maybe, that night. Basically, just as I wanted it.”

Susan looks at Linda now, gauging her reaction. But Linda’s mind has moved on, has accepted the facts of the events on Mull; not allowed herself to dwell on the mental images of Susan and Dave engaged in multiple sexual couplings in the course of just a few hours. She is already thinking about the implications. She tries to fill in the gaps of the intervening years as to why Dave Ramsey is now lying in a state of unconsciousness, his life in the balance. What is the continuing connection that brought him to this? As if reading her thoughts, Susan continues.

“He thought he had fallen in love. As far as I was concerned, it was over the moment I walked out of that manse and back to the hotel. I suppose I dominated him and for me, it was over as soon as that happened.”

“Did you tell him that?”

“No, I just said he had been cute. I left the island the next day. I had the distinct impression that Mike Moss knew but he said nothing and didn’t ask. Maybe he preferred to dismiss it in his mind. A month later, Dave turned up in the city at my flat. He was in love and he was ready to leave his wife. I got the whole bit, Linda. At first I thought it would be better to let him spend a bit of time with me and he kept on about how desperate he was. His marriage was a sham and he said Brenda was just a passive receptacle in bed. She was into wifely duty and nothing else. He had an experience with me that still excited him. It was stupid, but I just thought it would keep him quiet by letting him visit, and eventually, he would go away. Anyway, I wasn’t with anyone, not till Bill came along, and he sort of filled the sex gap for a while.” She gives Linda a look that says, “yes, stupid, I know”.

“Anyway, he got himself into the University here to do a post-graduate Divinity course and he was given a tenure in the City Cathedral. He has hounded me on and off in all sorts of ways ever since. He’s never actually threatened me but I simply don’t trust him or his mental state.”

“Do you think he would cause you physical harm, Susan?” This has not occurred to Linda till now.

“No. Well, I don’t think so. At least, I’m not sure. It’s more that he will spill the beans about the affair to the press, or to Brenda, or to my TV Company. He could be more malicious by telling the press, and he knows it. To be honest, Linda, I just don’t know anymore.”

Linda sits thinking, letting the silence fill the room. She starts to think aloud, checking out her train of thought with Susan as she goes.

“Just what are the risks here? You have no affection for this man, so that is simply not an issue, right?” She continues as Susan nods her head and takes a sip of wine. “So, we come back to the question of exposure. There was nothing about the affair in the note and he has obviously not told Brenda or she would not be turning to you. Correct?” Susan nods again. “So it looks to me as if, if he dies, his secret and yours, so to speak, will go to his grave. If he lives, he may start to spill the beans.”

“Exactly. No one else knows about it except, maybe, Mike. But if he does, he’s not likely to say anything. He was only guessing at the time. So my reasoning is that since I do have Brenda’s ear now, I might as well keep as close as I can and know what is happening.”

“Well, I see that makes sense for as long as the man is unconscious. But if he comes to, what do you do then?”

“I thought I’d try to see him, keep him on side if you like.”

“Is that not where it went pear-shaped before, when he got in touch with you after Mull?”

“I suppose so, but if I don’t show any concern he’s likely to start talking and blaming me. Don’t forget that he blamed me on the night of the overdose.”

Linda mulls this over. She can see Susan’s predicament. And, realistically, she knows she is not going to dissuade her from being in touch at the hospital. All she can advise is caution. And she can remind Susan that she has a safe friend in her. Maybe, in truth, she is Susan’s only real friend.

“Well, all I can think, bluntly, is that your problems are over if he doesn’t make it. Not that that’s a very nice thing to say but it is the reality. Meantime, please play it very carefully with Brenda. Will you keep me posted?”

Linda knows she is drawing this to a close too quickly, but she does want to be at that supper with Jane Gray. The more she is detained, the more she realizes how much.

“Of course.” Susan asks one last hesitant question.

“Do you think badly of me, Linda?”

Linda smiles, stands up and gives her friend a hug.

“Not at all. You are a braver person than I would be if I saw something that I wanted like that. Mind you,” she laughs, “I suppose that’s the bit I don’t understand. I’ve never felt like that about a stranger.” She sees instant loneliness in Susan’s eyes. “But don’t worry, my dear Susan, I don’t love you any the less for it.”

“Nothing happened between you and Mike, I take it?” Linda asks as an afterthought.

“No. He’s still on the TV studio team. And occasionally he used to ask me out. But he hasn’t lately – not since Bill and I got together.”

Linda glances at the clock. It is eight-fifteen

“God, I should be somewhere by now.”

“I’m so sorry. I’ve kept you. Can I drop you somewhere?”

“No. It’s right across town. I’ll get a taxi and ring on my mobile to say that I’m on my way.”

CHAPTER 7

Five minutes later she is listening to the dialling tone on Jane’s phone, apologising and saying that she will be there in ten. Jane is lovely, just pleased that she is able to come over and says that she will hold supper for her.

Two things occur to Linda as she watches the night city from the cab. She almost envies Susan her personal freedom, even if, just now, she is in a bit of trouble. And she is not sure yet why she did not want Susan to know that she is going to Jane’s flat.

The flat turns out to be on the first floor of a converted warehouse down by the city’s old harbour. In front of the flats, a boat restaurant that has long since ceased its sea-going days invites the affluent diner aboard. And further along the harbour, a number of fish restaurants with chalkboards outside make this an area where tourists and diners mill in the early spring evening.

Linda announces her arrival via the front security door intercom and enters a spacious and bright hallway. The presence of a lift indicates that this is going to be something of a luxury apartment. When the doors open to discharge her onto the first floor, Jane is already at the open door, smiling and welcoming her with an effusive dismissal of her guest’s apology for being late. She ushers Linda into a large, white-walled and rectangular room which has an open plan kitchen at one end, and a table and six chairs off to the right, offset by a floor to ceiling window that looks out over the harbour and its quayside restaurants. In the centre of the oak floored room are three beige coloured sofas, dominated by a wall hung collage of the outside scene and with a square coffee table on which wine glasses indicate the favoured drink of Jane’s guests.

Linda takes all this in with a glance, the query in her mind as to how Jane can afford this luxury on a senior lecturer’s salary dismissed as none of her business. Her attention is more immediately on the other guests and on Jane herself. Her hostess looks much more sophisticated here than in her office when wearing her smart University clothes. Tonight, she is wearing the type of black evening trousers that have wide enough legs to make it look like a skirt. On top, she has a cream coloured linen over-shirt with a low-slung broad black belt. The whole effect is finished off with her hair with a wide fringe in gamin style. This is a stylish Jane, younger and softer than the woman Linda has known till now. Linda is quietly stunned by how attractive Jane looks tonight and covers up her long look by an appreciative comment about Jane’s flat. But she has the uncomfortable impression that Jane has seen just how struck with her Linda is.

There are four other women in the room, all sitting around the coffee table, pausing in what is obviously an animated discussion, to greet the final member of the supper party. They appear to be women somewhere between Jane’s age and Linda’s. Jacky, a schoolteacher of languages is sitting next to Jenny, an artist and the creator, it later transpires, of the painting collage above the sofas. Nicola is a doctor working in a health centre in the city centre and used to some of the worst that social deprivation does to health. Beside her is Kate, an architect working for the local authority. How they all came to be friends and in the same room this evening is not mentioned.

There is a lively animation about these women as they say ‘Hi’, and gesture for Linda to join them on the empty sofa. Jane simply introduces her as Linda, her Professor from work, although Linda sees from their nods that they all know already who she is.

“We were just talking about the difference between arranged and forced marriages in Asian culture,” Jane says, as she puts white wine into Linda’s hand and sits by her.

“If any – difference, that is, “ Jacky recaps.

Everyone laughs, teasing Jacky for her outdated view and groaning as they do so. Nicola is strongly of the opinion that legislation should be brought in to prevent forced marriages and that the Asian community are prepared to support such a move. No one wants this particular conversation to go for another round and Jane takes the opportunity to invite everyone to the table to eat. They turn out to be a group of women who are used to meeting and chatting, and Linda is glad that they seem to be talking about issues without putting her on the spot to give her own opinions. They include her, though, by often looking in her direction and she begins to make the occasional observation as supper is being served. Her momentary fear, when she arrived and first saw all these women, that she was in for an evening of listening to the woes of their personal lives, has been quickly dispelled.

“And thank God for that,” she thinks. “Susan’s current problems are quite enough for now.”

No – as they sit, whilst Jane puts together a supper of pasta, asparagus and smoked salmon in a wine and cream sauce, and then eat it slowly with salad, parmesan and bread baked in the oven, the debates range with humour from fox hunting and animal rights to, almost inevitably, women’s safety and women’s rights. Linda listens to their views, sometimes serious, sometimes fervently held, sometimes stated with ribald swagger for effect. She contributes a little, enjoying the debate and becoming clearer about her own opinions on some of the issues as the meal progresses. She knows that these are all issues that she has thought about but that she ought to think about a great deal more. It is not the usual conversation of her own mixed sex dinner parties nor, definitely, of the staff lounge at the University.

Nicola deplores animal cruelty but feels that there has to be experimentation for the purposes of human medicine; Jenny tells her that one is not possible without the other. Kate thinks that it is outrageous that the city’s society has descended to the level where it is now impossible for women to travel about at night except in the safety of a taxi. Jane, who has until recently lived in New York, sys that the American cities can be ten times worse than anything in this country. Her experience of being over here has, so far, been one of comparative safety. And, no, she responds to Jacky’s question, she does not think that she is being complacent. She is for Zero Tolerance where attacks on women are concerned. Kate thinks that city planners still have a lot to learn about environmental strategies on safety that can be brought in, at relatively low cost – street lighting, city underpass TV systems and so on.

As if frustrated with the debate, Nicola comes in with the generalisation that none of them around the table will live long enough to see the true achievement of women’s equality in society. And if that is true in Western society, what chance for women in third world countries where anything from genital mutilation to genocide can and does happen?

“Take the simple example of the glass ceiling in organisations,” she expounds. “Hold this conversation with a man present and you will be debating whether or not such a thing exists. Hold the same conversation with a woman and it’s an accepted fact. Look at all of us. With the exception of our new friend, Linda,” she says, but in such a way that she is not attacking Linda, “We are all professional women who have done no more than make it to our professions. We have not made it within them. We are all first rung people.”

Kate comes in. “You obviously passed through the glass ceiling, Linda. How did you do it?”

Linda thinks for a moment as all eyes turn to her.

“I’m not sure that I would really see myself as through the glass. Yes, I am high in my profession, but the power in University terms is elsewhere. At least, that’s how it feels. I suppose,” she reflects, almost thinking aloud, “I suppose that I don’t threaten them. That’s how I get what I need for the Department. I argue with conviction.”

“So, you use expertise and influence rather than expertise and authority?” This comes from Nicola.

“I suppose so. That sounds pretty weak, doesn’t it?” Linda is not comfortable with the truth of what Nicola has just pinpointed. But Jane is coming to her rescue.

“At least Linda has made it. The rest of us have only made it so far and some of us would like to go higher. I don’t suppose any of you would believe me if I said that I don’t want to go higher in terms of a hierarchy?”

Jenny the artist believes her. She can see little attraction in not being simply and entirely one’s own person.

The spotlight moves away from Linda as coffee is served and as people begin to talk to one another, neighbour to neighbour round the table. As she chats and listens, Linda learns more about each of the guests. Kate’s partner, James, is also an architect and they are renovating an old barn outside the city boundaries. Jenny is celebrating her recent divorce from someone called Timothy. Linda has the distinct impression from the way she describes him to Nicola that Jenny is an abused wife.

The surprise of the evening for Linda comes as they are all ordering taxis to make their ways to different parts of the city. She simply had not seen that Nicola and Jacky are partners living together. Nothing has been said by anyone to indicate that this is the case. It has just not been an issue.

Saying goodnight to Jane, she also realizes what an able hostess they have all had. As the others ask Linda to join them again, she knows that she has been entertained with ease, that Jane has kept the conversation flowing, talking very little about herself. Linda promises to invite Jane over to the Pilar household really soon, aware as she does so that she is intrigued to know more about her young friend and colleague.

But it is Susan who dominates her thoughts as she makes her way home, weary at the thought that she still has computer work to do before the next day. Why would Susan, attractive and socially able, seduce Dave Ramsey, stranger and, by all accounts, social nerd? Why would anyone do that?

Too weary to face her lecture preparation, and promising herself an early morning start, she slips in beside Ken and crashes into deep sleep. Somewhere in the small hours an erotic dream about an orgy that she is watching, an orgy in which she recognizes Susan, Dave, Jacky and Nicola, wakes her in a state of arousal. She knows even as she wakes Ken and initiates lovemaking, that she is doing so as a flight into safety.

CHAPTER 8

As she drove home after her conversation with Linda, she more or less determined that she would listen to the caution that Linda augured and that she would resist going to the hospital. For all that, the evening was long and tedious as she made a makeshift meal from the fridge and filled the rest of the time before bed with a hot bath and a late night film.

At least now in the office this morning, her time and attention are absorbed elsewhere and she is genuinely looking forward to the studio TV debate, scheduled for tomorrow, about self-styled neo-Nazis and their infiltration into the pub culture of the disaffected youth of the country. It promises to be heated and just the challenge she needs. There was even a suggestion from her boss, Jonathon Whitley, that they might have a plain-clothed police presence in the studio.

Towards twelve, she and the team pause their planning meeting for a quick lunch break. As she comes out of the conference room, an assistant passes her a note. She takes the paper slip, half expecting that it will be from Brenda. But it has Bill’s name on it, asking her to call him urgently.

She rings, asking for Mr Nicolson. This is not like Bill, ringing her at work and interrupting his own office day.

“Ah. Yes, Miss Blakely. Mr Nicolson asked me to put you straight through. One moment please.” Susan recognises the voice of Bill’s secretary. She has met Fiona once or twice when she has occasionally called at Bill’s office for an evening in the city after work.

Bill comes on to the line almost immediately, saying it would be nice to meet for lunch after such a pleasant evening. He also says there is something he wants to mention. This sets an alarm bell ringing for Susan but she makes no comment. They agree to meet for a sandwich in one of the High Street’s pseudo French café bars. If they meet at twelve thirty, they will get a quiet table before the offices of the city disgorge their populations onto the streets and into the eating-houses around.

She arrives first and when Bill comes in she thinks that he looks tired and slightly strained. Their greeting is warm, though, and ordinary, very much one of two intimates meeting up in public. She chats about her morning and about the latest city scandal that has hit the lunchtime billboards. The chairman of one of the city’s local authority committees has made false travel claims over a protracted period. The National Audit Body is to undertake a root and branch check of audit trails in local government.

They order a cafetiere of coffee and savoury croissants filled with hot French Brie. Susan works at being as warm as she was last night. She asks him how his first day back at work since the conference has gone and how he has found time to break into the day to see her. Even forewarned that he wants to discuss something, she simply has not anticipated what he says next.

“Susan, I’ve received an anonymous letter – about you.”

“What about me?” is all she asks. Her emotions freeze.

“About you and that man Dave.”

She looks at him, saying nothing, giving nothing away, and waits. This seems to have the psychological effect of loosening some sense of resolve in him. He hesitates and takes a moment to work out what to say next.

“Susan, have you had a sexual involvement with this man? The letter says you have.”

She looks at him, steady eyed. Her decision is instant.

“No, Bill, I haven’t. Of course I haven’t. Why? What does the letter say? Can I see it?”

They stare at each other in a silence that blocks out the buzz of the restaurant.

“What does the letter say, Bill?” She asks again more forcefully now and looks straight at him, inviting an immediate answer. He takes it from his pocket and hands it to her in silence. She takes it. It is hand written in a style that she recognises immediately. It is Dave Ramsey’s handwriting.

With a glance at Bill, she opens it and stares in horror at the sight of stick people drawn down each side of the tightly written script. She reads about a sexual liaison between herself and a minister of the church and a version of her seduction of this man three years ago on the island of Mull. It describes in detail what she did to the man on the first encounter and how she ‘whored’ herself. No one, the letter says, will ever know Susan Blakely like this man has. The stick people leave the reader in no doubt as to the sexual favours she bestowed, and had bestowed on her, that night.

The letter ends by saying that Bill would be better off without Susan Blakely – she is a cheating tramp. The letter is signed from a well-wisher.

Susan looks up and says, simply,

“Oh, God.”

“Is it true, Susan?” he asks for a second time, his face ashen now. She looks him directly in the eye.

“No, Bill, it isn’t. Not like this,” she says, waving the letter. “I spent an evening with him, that’s all, in Mull a couple of years ago. Long before I knew you. Things got a bit out of hand, that’s all. I had to stop him that night, Bill, but nothing happened. Truly. He has pestered me on and off since. I know I shouldn’t have accepted the invitation but he seemed such an upstanding man. This must be his revenge for refusing him. The man is sick.” She pauses and challenges her partner. “Bill, do you believe me?”

He looks at her and at that moment she feels that his answer is honest.

“I suppose I do, Susan, but we can talk more about it later.”

Then a thought occurs to her.

“Bill, it’s four days since Dave Ramsey rang me and he went into the hospital. How did you receive this only this morning? I assume that Ramsey wrote this and that it’s not some other crank?”

Bill takes the letter and reads it again, as if reading it again word for word, looking for clues with his solicitor’s mind; any evidence to tell him whether this is a joke or a crank’s work.

“Well, I think that we can assume that Ramsey wrote it. It has actually been in the office for a day or two. I didn’t see it at first – it was in a file of papers marked ‘Personal’ and usually that file just holds those adverts that are made to look as if they are personal. So Fiona ignored it till I had time to clear my desk.”

He looks at her again, his eyes almost pleading.

“Susan, tell me that this is not true.” He lowers his voice “This is more than I can get my head round. The idea of you like that,” he gestures at the letter, “ It’s just not the way you are; not the way we are. I thought we had a satisfying sexual relationship, Susan. All morning, I’ve been wondering if this is true; if there’s a Susan Blakely that I don’t know. I can’t say what this morning has been like.” He looks almost broken as he sits there and Susan puts a hand out to reassure him.

“Bill, I’ve told you the truth. Nothing happened. And I don’t behave like that.” Now she is pointing at the letter. “You should know that.” She watches him intently, waiting for his belief in what she is saying.

He seems to come to from his own reverie and Susan sighs inwardly with relief. The moment passes and she is safe. She is a liar, but she is safe.

As if some inner dilemma is over, Bill gets his professional mind to work now after a kiss across the table to her cheek.

“The interpersonal politics of this are nasty, Susan.” He does not need to tell her this but she listens intently to his interpretation. “I have no intention of falling into this man’s agenda. Presumably he wants me to believe this and dump you. That would be some sort of punishment in his twisted mind for you not agreeing to a relationship with him.”

“Precisely, Bill.” She hardly needs to say anything. She is on the homeward straight as far as her security with Bill is concerned. Bill has given her a prefect explanation for the letter.

“But you could be in serious difficulty if this gets out into the public domain, I take it?”

She nods as he goes on, warming to his theme.

“A sexual liaison, allegedly, with a church minister who then goes on to attempt or commit suicide – that would make big press. We need to protect you, Susan. Let’s start by getting rid of this. And if there’s anything else, you have your friendship with me to cover you. I’ll look after you, my Darling Susan.” He is tearing the letter into tiny pieces and stuffing it into his empty cup as he speaks.

“You are the one who is the darling, Bill,” Susan says, rising from the table and kissing him. “Thank you.”

As she walks back to her office, Susan’s main thoughts are about the lies that she has just told. Linda’s advice to come clean with Bill is ringing in her head. She hated lying but how could she tell the truth in the face of the letter’s graphic pictures? She could not afford an outraged Bill, running loose with the sense of betrayal that he could only have felt. He would have left her – she is sure of it. In the circumstances, it was a justified lie. It caused least harm, as much to Bill as to her.

The day drags past. But there is plenty to occupy her at work. She finally comes out into the early evening twilight at about six. It is the time of year when she becomes aware of the birds of the city singing. The promise of spring and summer ahead always lifts her spirits. But tonight, the spectre of Dave Ramsey in his hospital bed is all that comes to her, descending on to her shoulders like the darkness itself. Is he still alive?

She eases her car from the studio car park into the evening traffic, gets to the first set of lights and sits, as they change to amber and then green. She turns right instead of left, as she normally would, and heads to the hospital. It is impulse but today she is working on impulse a lot.

She makes her way to the nurses’ station, looking from there at the bed in the room opposite. Dave Ramsey is still there. Staff Nurse Jones is at the desk and to Susan’s question tells her that he is holding his own. The new drug seems to be having some effect. But he is still in and out of consciousness.

Susan looks at the people around Dave’s bed. As well as Brenda, there appear to be two couples – she assumes that they must be Dave and Brenda’s parents. Brenda is sitting facing the door beside the woman whom Susan takes to be her mother. There is little conversation happening. Susan surmises that the serious talking has happened, and that waiting is all that there is to do now. The strain on the faces around the bed tells its own story. Brenda glances up as if sensing Susan’s presence and a weary smile momentarily lights her face. She indicates to Susan to come in but Susan does not want to be drawn into the family group and signs to Brenda that she will not intrude.

Brenda comes out, watched by her mother, a pleasantly faced lady in her sixties, wearing a shabby overcoat and flat shoes.

“How is he, Brenda? I didn’t want to interrupt but I was passing on my way home.”

“It is looking a bit more hopeful, Miss Blakely. Susan, I mean. Doctor Semple says that we should know one way or the other by tomorrow.”

“That’s reasonable news, Brenda Dear,” Susan says with a smile, doubting as she speaks whether it is, as far as she is concerned. “Has he said anything when he has been conscious?”

“No. Just what he said before – that he made a mistake with the amount of pills. He won’t tell me or his Mum and Dad what it’s all about.” As she speaks, Brenda points towards the couple with their backs to them. They look from their attire to be country people, maybe a not-too-well-off gentleman farmer and his wife. How little she bothered to find out about this man, in her haste to be rid of him.

“That’s your own Mum and Dad, is it?”

“Yes. They’ve come in every day since the accident.”

Susan hears the word ‘accident’ and realizes that this must be how the family are choosing to refer to the overdose. Euphemisms help at a time like this, she supposes.

Brenda is still talking.

“Mum’s a home help and Dad’s retired but he works part time as a traffic person for school children. They moved over here when Dave got the job at the Cathedral.”

“They must be very fond of you to have done that – move home, I mean.”Susan wonders how Dave Ramsey could have disrupted so many lives in his obsession with her.

Brenda is about to say something when a tall, grey haired gentleman wearing a dog collar comes through the swing doors. Susan reckons that he must be somewhere in his early sixties. He comes straight over towards Brenda.

“Hello, Reverend Graham. He’s still sleeping,” she says, nodding at the bed. “Reverend Graham, this is Miss Blakely. Susan, Reverend Graham is Dave’s boss at the Cathedral. He has been talking to Dave when he’s awake.”

“Miss Blakely? Miss Susan Blakely?” The Reverend Graham scrutinises her closely, to the point where she is quickly uncomfortable. She resents the assumed authority of ministers at the best of times. Just now, she feels judgement heaping onto her shoulders.

“Yes. I did not know that ministers had bosses, Reverend. Are you the main minister at the Cathedral?”

“No. No, there are several of us. And we have only the loosest of managerial arrangements.” The minister is still looking very closely at Susan. He has a kindly face though, even if it looks worried at the moment.

Brenda comes in, glancing into the room to make sure that the parents are out of earshot.

“Has he said why? Was it my fault?”

Susan feels something like compassion for the plaintive tone in Brenda’s voice as she asks the question.

The minister looks first at Susan and then at Brenda. Again, Susan feels that sense of discomfort that has been with her over the days since all this started.

“He has said why, my Dear, yes. But he has asked me to keep our conversation in confidence. I am sure you understand. What I can say to you is that it most certainly is not your fault. You have absolutely nothing to reproach yourself for. It is important that you believe this.” He looks, not at Brenda as he says this, but straight at Susan, as if to emphasise a different point. “I will be back later to see Dave, again. Would you like me to say a prayer for him whilst we are together?”

Susan has not a religious bone in her body and stands, silent and seething at the presumption of this prayer for Dave’s life happening over her head. But she can hardly say no; she sees that. It feels awkward though, standing there outside the little room, heads bowed and listening to the quiet tones of the minister. After the ‘amen’, Brenda says “thank you” as if some favour has been bestowed on them.

Despite the forewarning, Susan is not prepared for the long look that the minister gives her or the implicit invitation in his parting words.

“I hope that I may see you again, Miss Blakely. If there is anything that I can do to help, please contact me.”

She stares at him, silently blanking his invitation until he turns around and heads quietly into Dave’s room, shutting the door softly behind him. Rankled, and catching the vaguest of puzzled looks on Brenda’s face, she dismisses the minister’s parting remarks with a quip,

“Looking for another sheep, is he?”

This makes Brenda titter at the irreverence of the comment and she looks at Susan with almost embarrassing awe. But Susan takes the moment of laughter to take her leave, ushering Brenda off towards her family.

Back in her car, she would have a cigarette except that she does not smoke. But she knows that her nerves are badly jangled. It certainly looks as if Ramsey has spilled the beans to this minister. That was one invitation that she will certainly not be picking up. Ramsey’s revelations will stay well within the confines of confession. She is not about to corroborate anything.

She tries to ring Linda in the evening, just for the comfort of having someone to talk to. But Linda is at a lecture and Tina does not know when she will be back. Restless in her own company, she rings Bill on impulse and invites herself round for supper, a supper that they both knew will end with her staying the night and her going into the studio tomorrow morning from there.

As she lies much later in Bill’s sleeping arms, she feels safe somehow. Dave Ramsey might well be alive, but he is talking only to his minister, who must not say anything to anyone. Bill believes her that she never had sex with Ramsey. She has reason to let herself relax into a deep, relieved sleep.

The TV programme on neo-Nazism is not the fireworks display that she and the team all hoped for. But it is very passable entertainment, none the less, and she is in gratified mood as she sits through the debrief.

By six o’clock, she is ready for a drink and suggests one for the road to the team. They wander off to collect coats, and she is donning her own jacket, when Jonathon Whitley comes into the conference room. Can he see her in his office?

She smiles at Jonathon. At fifty something, bald headed and shirt sleeved, he is everyone’s firm, no-nonsense uncle of a boss.

“Could it wait till morning, Jonathon? We were all just going out for a drink. Want to come?”

“No,” Jonathon said. “It’s urgent; something I’ve been sitting on till after today’s programme.”

Susan looks at him and follows him to his office. He closes the door behind them and goes round to his side of the desk, gesturing to her to sit as he eases himself into his chair. He pulls out a file from a drawer and simply pushes it over to Susan.

She takes it and opens it. Inside is a letter in the same handwriting as the one that Bill received.

She hardly needs to open it. But she does, already preparing to feign surprise at the contents – drawings of stick people and another account of her sexual activities on Mull.

CHAPTER 9

Linda hates all the preparations for the Department’s annual series of public lectures but always enjoys the event when it finally comes along. They take place over four consecutive weeks and it falls to her to host all but the last event, giving the final paper as the leader of the host institution.

This year, she has chosen ‘Preservation’ as the theme of the series. All the papers so far have been erudite, ranging from the preservation of sites in modern day cities to the latest applications of laser technology in the exploration of sites, without opening these sites up to air and so to corrosion. Her own paper, due tonight, looks at preservation issues in rural areas where conflicting interests of land owners and historians often threaten existing sites or deny the excavation of newly discovered locations. Her thesis is that some significant popularisation of interest in ancient civilisations is going to be necessary if the wealth of available knowledge is to be protected for future generations. The future of archaeology is no longer the preserve of archaeologists – it is now a matter for public and political debate and hopefully for increased funding through grants for research, tourist income and government grants to historic bodies.

Her address is to be something of a rallying call to the vested interests represented in the audience. It will bring the lecture series to its formal end, and will be followed by a supper in the conference hotel that they have used for the occasion over the last six years. This last evening is always popular and it is only after the business proper is over that Linda will allow herself some degree of relaxation.

No matter how often she speaks in lectures and seminars, giving this particular paper is different. So many of her peers from other institutions will be present, not to mention the general wise and the good, there to promote some body or business concern.

Ken never comes with her to these events. By and large, they do not like to have each other in their audiences and they both acknowledge that they are freer to mingle and to do the social niceties that are expected of them if they are on their own.

It is a dignified audience of just over two hundred, many in evening attire, who drift into the lecture hall, most with a first gin or whisky inside them. Linda checks the lectern, the lighting and the presentation programme on her computer. She has long since learned that, even with the best technician’s assistance, things can and do go wrong and that it is safest to prepare the presentation oneself.

Robert Thane, the Principal of the University, comes to join her on the platform – he will chair the evening and his unspoken role for now is to put Linda at her ease and to fill the minutes for her till the meeting opens.

The room fills slowly. Linda and the Principal take their seats, talking inconsequential matters about the University until he starts the evening with a quick check to Linda that she is ready. He brings the room to an expectant hush as he rises and speaks into the microphone.

With all due gravitas and just a smattering of humour, he opens this final session, introduces Linda Pilar, Professor of Archaeology, and gives the title of the lecture –‘Preservation: The Way Forward’.

It always seems like a long walk to the lectern but Linda is well known and respected in these circles and the applause eases her way across the platform. After the obligatory words of introduction and the equally necessary joke, this one at the expense of her profession, she is underway and she settles into her talk within three well-calculated minutes.

Right away, it is clear to all that she is on top of her subject and her audience is with her. It goes so well that she brings her intended forty-five minute lecture to a perfectly timed end. She and the Principal have to sit for several minutes till the applause dies down. Then it is time for a few questions, some of them searching, none of them out of Linda’s ability to handle them. Then the Principal brings the meeting to its end, thanking the various speakers for their contributions and Linda and her Department for the series as a whole.

Now the evening is open for drinks, a further word of welcome and thanks to the guests, and for the buffet supper. Linda mingles among the guests, talking archaeology with those who are interested, University business with others; asking about the different professional worlds of other people there.

By the time coffee is being served, the numbers are beginning to thin. Most of her Departmental colleagues have come over and had a word with her, and most are in a group now, enjoying the rare opportunity to get together in a semi-social setting. She is conscious that Jane has not been over, though she has noticed her looking in Linda’s direction several times. Just now, she is talking with a group of men, coffee cup in one hand. There is a lot of laughter coming from this group, Jane holding forth about something to the evident intrigue of her listeners. She is nothing if not gregarious, Linda thinks, and she seems to have a charismatic personality way beyond the usual in this country.

A tall man whom Linda does not recognise appears to be her escort for the evening – her partner, Linda wonders. Linda has still to thank Jane for last evening’s supper party and determines that if Jane does not come and say hello she will make a point of talking with her.

Another half hour or so passes before she has the opportunity – a half hour at the end of which she is pinned in a corner by a local authority councillor, puffed with his own importance and keen to share his full knowledge of matters archaeological in the city. This does not take too long, but by the time he has embellished his stories of mediaeval city life, Linda is struggling to maintain her politeness.

Off behind the good councillor’s shoulders, she sees Jane and her escort approaching, both in evening dress and, Linda thinks, making a handsome couple. Jane’s eyes twinkle with amusement and she is obviously on her way over to rescue Linda. Her escort, several inches taller than Jane, is a handsome fellow, broad shouldered and fair-haired like Jane herself. He must be in his early forties, Linda guesses, casting a relaxed and friendly smile in their direction.

“Excuse us. Good evening. That was an excellent address and supper, Linda. Congratulations.” Jane says it pleasantly but with enough force to ensure that the councillor has to stop in mid sentence.

Linda introduces them.

“Jane. Thank you. Can I introduce Councillor Robertson. Councillor, This is Doctor Jane Grey.” The councillor ogles Jane with barely concealed interest.

Linda waits to be introduced to the man by Jane’s side.

“Linda, this is my brother, Harry. Harry, Linda.”

Somewhere inside her, Linda recognises something like relief as the American accent of Harry says pleasant things about the University in which his sister now works. But her feeling is fleeting, and not crystallised into thought before it evaporates. She asks what brought Harry to the city. Was it Jane or something else as well? Harry, Jane intervenes, lives near their parents in Colorado but works in Information Technology and is quite often in the city. They shared the purchase of Jane’s flat and Harry stays with her on his business trips. Linda sees now how Jane afforded that flat on her lecturer’s salary.

They make a good double act as brother and sister and, in what is obviously a prearranged pact, Harry is suddenly desperately interested in local politics and rescues Linda from Councillor Robertson, leaving Jane and her free for a word. The councillor is more or less happy – he still has an audience even if he has no opportunity to chat up Jane.

Linda takes her opportunity to say how much she enjoyed the supper and Jane’s friends.

“So refreshing to talk like that. And you were a great hostess, Jane. You made it look so easy to host six people by yourself. I’m one of those women who needs all the help I can get.”

They laugh and Linda suggests a little wine. As Jane agrees, they walk over to the drinks table and stand as a young waiter pours a half glass of reasonable Sauvignan for each of them.

“I hope you felt comfortable with the others?” Jane asks, “We’ve all known each other for most of the time since I came to the city.”

“Yes, I did. They all made me very welcome. And they were all interesting too. Jacky and Nicola make a nice couple.” She looks at Jane with a smile as she says this. Jane smiles back with an unspoken understanding that this is all that needs to be said.

“Yes. Aren’t they?

Linda shifts the focus of their conversation.

“You know, Jane, for all that it was a special evening, I came away not knowing much more about you than when I arrived. Except that you have a fabulous flat and good friends. Tell me a bit more. I’m curious about your family and what you did before you came here. I know the academic stuff from interview of course. I was thinking more about why you would leave the States for here – that sort of thing.

Jane tells her the basics. She grew up, she says, in small town America in the Colorado foothills. She went to local college and lived at home as a newly qualified teacher.

“Then I met this guy called Ricky and we dated for years. I eventually agreed to move into a flat with him but I sure didn’t want to marry him. Harry was ace. He backed me with the parents and said that he didn’t see why I should be destined to 2.4 children and a holiday condo in the mountains.”

Linda listens, imagining Jane’s parents as some kind of ogres. Jane seems to second-guess her thoughts.

“My parents are good guys, you know. They’re the product of their society, that’s all. They are deeply religious, the Methodists in America, maybe more than anywhere else. It almost defeated them that I lived with Ricky in the first place and I guess they just could not understand me not marrying him. Anyway, there was something of a family row and I took off to New York, threw over the teaching job and enlisted to do post graduate studies in archaeology.”

“Why New York? And why chose archaeology, of all things? It seems a strange subject for a young American woman.”

“Well, New York because I wanted to think more freely than I could do in small town Colorado. So I joined a lot of women’s groups and clubs and, I have to say, had a very educational and fun time.”

Jane’s eyes twinkle at the memory. Linda almost envies her that experience, her mind going back to the conducive atmosphere of the supper party.

“I chose archaeology because I was once on a trip to Europe many years ago with my High School. We went to Rome and Paris and we did all the sites. I was taken with the ancient buildings and the idea of people like us, but different from us, living in those places. Anyway, we went over to Naples and visited Pompeii. That’s where I really got the bug. The whole place was quiet that morning and we could wander pretty freely down the streets and see what life must have been like before the volcano blew. It was awesome, Linda, walking in the same streets where people’s lives just ended like candles snuffed out. I just wanted to know more and more ever since.”

Linda already knows that Jane has taken every opportunity since coming to the University to be in Europe, visiting sites open to the public or linking up through university channels with summer digs, the last one somewhere in the Alps.

“So, is that you in a nutshell, Jane? Running away from conventional expectations? And now you are a women’s issues advocate and an ancient history buff?” Linda is teasing Jane but fishing; she does not know for what.

“Not quite, Linda, but that’s enough for now,” Jane grins, in what Linda imagines is slightly provocative or teasing mode. “Here’s Harry. Now I won’t learn any more about you. Not tonight, anyway.”

She says the last words with a straight look at Linda. There is an unspoken invitation here to which Linda has no opportunity to respond. Instead, Jane asks a pretty neutral question about Linda’s family life. Linda tells her about her parents’ death and about the gap that left in her life. She has a brother too, she explains, but he is in Canada. Danny is the really successful one in the family – both the director of a veterinary practice and head of a school of veterinary medicine. Linda’s tone changes almost imperceptibly as she says this and she knows her age-old touch of jealousy over her brother is raising its ugly head. She feels herself blush slightly.

Jane must have heard the tone in Linda’s voice change as she describes Danny and Linda comes back immediately,

“Don’t misunderstand me – I adore Danny and I don’t see nearly enough of him. He was just always so much more important after a childhood illness to my parents than I ever was. I always wanted to follow in his footsteps, I suppose.”

She changes the subject as Jane watches her without saying anything.

“Ken and I must see you at the house soon. And you too, Harry, if you are in town again soon. We’d love to have you over for a meal.”

The conversation drifts for a few minutes. Harry asks some questions about what holding the title of ‘professor’ feels like outside the academic cloisters and Linda says that she prefers to be called Mrs Pilar when in her private world. As she says it, she regrets it – Jane would be Doctor or Ms; certainly not Miss, she knows that. How conventional she is, to think of herself as Mrs in this day and age. Jane just smiles.

She enjoys her exchange with Jane for all that it is anodyne. There is a rapport here and she feels at ease with her. She would like to go on talking. She leaves, vaguely disconcerted; aware that something else is somehow in the ether.

She does not get home till nearly midnight but the following day is Saturday, and she can sleep as late as the children’s weekend diaries permit. Ken is waiting up for her, sitting with a whisky in the TV lounge. He stands to greet her, offers her a brandy and settles her by him on the sofa.

But she does not want to talk much except to tell him about the lecture going well. For whatever reason, she does not want to talk about socialising with Jane and her brother Harry. She has already told him about the supper party – most of it anyway – and had a jesting remark back from him about women’s libbers. Best leave the subject alone, she decides. Fortunately, Ken has his own news to impart concerning the forthcoming summer. The kids are interested in a youth camp somewhere in the Pyrenees. Kenny found out about it on the Internet. If he, Ken, took them down there whilst she was on her summer dig he could go over to Llanes, on the north Spanish coast where his parents live, and spend that fortnight with them. He could collect the kids after their camp and take them into Spain. Linda could fly out to join them all when the dig was over. What does she think? It makes a lot of sense but Linda agrees with him that they need to know a great deal more about this camp before they make any final decisions. These days, she points out to Ken, you can’t be too careful. As a GP, Ken is only too aware of that and promises that they will be very careful indeed, especially for young Angela.

But she likes the thought of a few weeks when she could be free of the dreadful feeling of being away herself whilst the family are at home waiting for her return. And she listens contentedly in bed as Ken describes some of the things that he would like to do in the time he might now have with his parents. They are at the age where a visit inevitably entails a check on any repairs or decoration in the house and a quiet ear to the ground on their health. And it would be good for Ken to have them to himself for a while. Yes, with the time that she will have with the children herself in the early part of their summer holiday, it is shaping up to be a good time ahead for them all. She drifts off to sleep, looking forward to the next day’s inevitable excited pleas from the children that they should go to this camp in France.

Sure enough, the morning starts with an over-boisterous Angela appearing in the room, followed by Kenny. There is a tray of boiled eggs for Ken and her – the children’s traditional treat for their parents when they want to celebrate something, or, as this morning, when they want a family conference. She lets herself be persuaded very slowly as she eats her egg and toast, asking all sorts of questions about the camp and the costs and how they would cope without their parents there. It takes the kids an hour but they have moved her from “We’ll see” to “Well, perhaps” by the time the breakfast session is over. The kids head off, pleased with their negotiations and ready to divert their attentions to the day in hand.

Ken is to take them, with their bikes on the back of the family estate, for a cycle around the vast public park and lake to the south of the city. They will all meet up in the afternoon for pizzas and a trip to the cinema. With sotto voce mutterings to his wife that he does not see when they will have their own private time and a riposte from Linda that there is always bedtime, Ken is off to the shower before ten o’clock and on with the business of the day.

Linda is free for the day to shop for some clothes and to see to preparations for the Sunday joint. Tina is on a free weekend and the house is her own. She bathes rather than showers and takes her time, playing some operatic arias that would not have gone down too well had Kenny been in the house. Being on her own is a luxury that happens only seldom and she is in no hurry to be dressed and out. At twelve, she makes a jug of fresh coffee and is about to sit with the Saturday supplement to the daily paper when the doorbell rings.

Susan is outside. Right away, Linda knows that there have to be more problems with the Dave Ramsey situation. She is a little disappointed in a selfish way at the loss of her peace and quiet. Susan does not usually call unannounced and seems to know that she is interrupting. She is full of apologies as she makes her way into the kitchen.

“Nonsense,” Linda protests, genuine in her remorse that she was not more open and welcoming. Her friendship is not of much use if she does not support Susan when she needs it. “What’s the situation now?”

“I saw Brenda again last night. It will be today before they know that he’s definitely going to pull through.”

Linda gives no reaction to the fact that Susan must have gone to the hospital. What good would criticism do? Instead, she listens quietly to Susan’s account of how the minister seemed to know what happened between the two lovers and to the story of the two anonymous letters, presumably written by Ramsey.

She can see how Susan hasdecided that it is now impossible to tell Bill about the affair, from the lurid account that she has had to deny. Linda would hate the mortification of anyone depicting her sex life, no matter its conventional nature, with Ken. She can imagine the stick drawings and the effect that they would have on Bill. Bill is such a nice, but almost straight-laced, person. He presumably will also be the jealous type. Privately, she still thinks that Susan should have come clean about it on the night of the attempted suicide. At least she would not now be struggling with it on her own without Bill. He would probably have backed her. Now, it might well be too late, if the truth somehow or other comes out.

But it is not so much the letter that Bill received that is worrying Susan. She clearly thinks that she handled that and that it is under control. No, it is the letter to her boss, Jonathon.

“How did he react, Susan?” Susan’s job could be on the line.

“He was very good. I stonewalled him, really; just looked at him to see how he was going to respond. He didn’t even ask if it was true. He just said it must be the troubled work of an equally troubled mind and to forget it as far as the TV Company is concerned. If it gets out any further, though, he thinks it could be more serious.”

“So, you are OK as far as the programme is concerned?

“It looks that way, for now. At the end of the day, they need me on that show, Linda. The ratings are good and it’s something of a flagship. Silence, that’s the best policy” Susan sounds as if she is quoting her boss. And she probably is.

“I agree. Who would believe the word of a mentally deranged suicidal minister who is so out of your sphere and league that it’s not true? It’s hardly credible, Susan. You just need to say nothing and hope that it’s over - whether he lives or dies.”

Linda is about to pour Susan some more coffee when she realizes that tears are trickling down her friend’s cheeks. It has not occurred to her that Susan might be feeling the strain of all this to the point of distress. She puts an arm around her.

“Come on. It will be OK, you know. It’s got to you, hasn’t it?”

Susan’ tears overwhelm her for a few moment. Linda has never seen her anything other than cool-headed and in command.

“Linda, I would give anything sometimes to just be ordinary and settled – like I said in the bistro the night all this started.”

“Come on, Susan, you know that that’s not really true. You would hate an ordinary life. You would be bored, frankly.”

This makes Susan smile and Linda laughs. “Perhaps it could be a little less dangerous than it is just now, but you like excitement, Susan. Admit it. And there is always a time beyond a bad time, you know. You will get through this.

“I suppose. I envy you, you know, Linda. You seem to have it all.”

Linda looks at this friend of hers, crystallising in a flash just what it is that is on her mind and tempted to tell her. Instead, she says, simply,

“If only I did.

CHAPTER 10

When it comes down to it, she really only has two friends – Linda and Bill. Of course, she has many acquaintances, met mainly through work, and she never needs to worry about spending time on her own if she does not want to. It is rather the reverse; that she has to make the time in the week to see to the mundane things of life – bills, cleaning, shopping for food. But when it comes to having people with whom she can really relax, there are only these two.

For all that, Susan is finding that her life is a lonely place to be, indeed a lonely and vulnerable place. It is lonely because she cannot entrust the whole story of her background to either Linda or Bill. She could not tell Linda because she has always seemed to be such a conventional person; nor could she talk to Bill because that could cost her this relationship.

Linda has been a stalwart during the early days of the attempted suicide. Susan knows that, without her, she would have burst at her own seems as first one letter and then the next smashed into her life. Linda has steered her through these days of crisis even though Susan has hardly, at the end of the day, followed her friend’s words of advice. She was in touch with Brenda, after all. Without her friend, she would have been a neurotic mess by the end of that week. Somehow, some of Linda’s calm has filtered into her own psyche.

As the days pass, and as the world goes on without anything tumbling from the sky onto her crown, she begins to relax again and to find more of her old self-confidence. She stops looking back at her past and her need to talk with Linda begins to dissipate. Besides, she reasons, you can only go on off-loading onto friends for so long and Linda is a very busy woman. Susan has the distinct impression that Linda has her own preoccupations at present, although she has not said what they are.

Bill is a different matter. By the end of the week she knows that she is very fortunate in having him. His acceptance of her word over Ramsey has been reassuring, especially as she knows how hurt he would have been had he known the truth. She knows that in Bill she has someone who seems to genuinely love and support her. Her thoughts are beginning to turn slowly but with greater certainty to the prospect of marriage. She likes this man enormously and said just that to Linda at one point – that she was very much in like with him. Linda just asked if that was any basis for marriage. Susan did not reply; just shrugged her shoulders with a hint of indifference – or was it defiance?

She is not in love; she knows that. Then again, she knows that she never really has been – not with anyone. At times of quiet thought, maybe on her own with a glass of wine and some background music, she thinks about this. She never does so without a fleeting picture of her father entering her mind – a picture that causes her momentary grief and which she dismisses as quickly as possible. Just once, with too much drink inside her, she cried out, “Why did you leave me?”

As the weeks of late spring pass, life at the TV Studio moves forward. The series is due to end its run in a few weeks and she will be free to get out of the city or perhaps start some negotiations for new work with some other TV networks. After all, this city is nice but it is not the be all and end all. But promotion will probably entail a move to London and she is not sure that she could tolerate life in the capital again. She did that in her early career and hated it as much as she thrived on it. Whatever else, professional thinking time lies ahead, as well as some leisure time.

Bill remains as attentive as always, for a while almost at greater pains than usual to reassure her of his love and support. Sexually, he seems more demanding and this pleases her. There is now an erotic content to their weekends together that had begun to flag before the suicide week. If her mind drifts away from him during sex to other scenarios or to other men, real and imaginary, she lets it. What woman, she reasons, does not think private thoughts to break the tedium?

Occasionally, though, Bill is moody now, saying little, and she might catch him looking at her across his lounge as they read the papers or, worse, when she is undressing or showering. He scrutinises her with a kind of puzzled enquiry in his expression. She knows what this is about. He is jealous of what might have happened with Ramsey. He said something late one night about imagining her behaving as the letter described and depicted. She knows that he struggles with the images of the stick people. She never talks about it, preferring to reassure him as best she can with her attention, personal and intimate, that the letter is false. But for whatever reason, neither of them broaches the subject of marriage or of moving in together, which were Bill’s suggestions just so recently.

But she knows she would now say yes to marriage if he asked. It would offer protection and a haven at a time when she feels vulnerable to she knows not quite what. In all this, it is Bill’s occasional distance from her that gives her that feeling of vulnerability. She now has a sense of what life would be like without him – a lonelier place than before she met him and one in which she would be even more a prey to her own predilections.

She saw Brenda only occasionally. The young woman rang Susan with the news that Ramsey would survive. Once again, they met at the Café Noir. Brenda entered the black, white and brown decorated café, looking sadly out of place in her bedraggled raincoat which was hanging open to reveal the same twin set that Susan had seen her wearing at the renal unit. Susan could see that Brenda was glad to see her.

Brenda was keen to tell Susan the story. This new drug worked. But there was little enthusiasm in her tone and, if Susan detected flatness in Brenda, she dismissed it as probably caused by exhaustion. It was almost three weeks from when her husband’s life had hung in the balance before Dr Semple gave him the final clearance from the oedema from which he was suffering. Brenda told her that the consultant described him as a lucky man. It was a long and tedious three weeks for Brenda. Sitting with a man who was possibly about to die had drama about it. Sitting with a taciturn, uncommunicative patient on his way to recovery was stressful and, yes, tedious.

Susan listened to Brenda’s account of how Dave had been transferred to psychiatric hospital. At the time that was music to her ears. Dave was out of the way and any attempt he might make to attack Susan with further letters or revelations could now be attributed to his disturbed mind.

Brenda said she thought he would be fine now and really did not see why he had to go to a mental hospital.

“The depressed person can be the last one to see his or her own symptoms, Brenda,” Susan said softly, looking up from her coffee cup.

The psychiatrist, apparently, suggested that there was much more work for Dave to do before he would be well. He and Dave had talked and medication, counselling and rest were now vital to his recovery. Dave was still very ill in emotional terms and the medic did not think it was wise for him to go home just yet. Dave needed to take time to sort out what had happened and to prepare for the future.

Brenda accepted this at the time but Dave protested. He was sure that he could cope at home. He mentioned then for the first time to Brenda that he was not to work for the moment – the church still had to decide what to do with him. In reply to Susan’s question, Brenda said she had no idea what it was all about except that Dave had been talking to the Reverend Graham and would not say any more. Privately, Susan surmised that the church would not want an adulterer and a suicidal personality leading God’s work in the city.

They asked Dave to come into hospital voluntarily. But he was not to go out even into the grounds without a nurse with him. And if he would not agree to voluntary admission, they would make a decision about whether or not he was still a risk to himself. If he did not agree they could admit him on a compulsory order.

As she listened to Brenda’s account, Susan thought he might also be considered a risk to others – her. But she said nothing. This was all sounding better and better to Susan’s attentive ear.

“So, he either agreed to go or he went anyway.” Brenda said this with a tone of finality. “Dave didn’t tell the doctor how much talk happened between him and Reverend Graham. Perhaps if he had, this might not have happened. Or perhaps he should have told the doctor and not the minister what was troubling him.”

Sitting listening to all this, Susan felt as if some unseen threat was being lifted away from her. She reassured Brenda that it was probably for the best that Dave was in psychiatric care.

After that she made a point of not being available when Brenda rang or of using the answer phone to block her calls. It was best, now, to let that link fade away and to leave that sad pair to their sad lives. The days passed and the calls from Brenda stopped. Just to cover her back in terms of a little apparent concern, she sent Brenda a final pleasant note in which she said that she was just hoping that things would now improve for her and for Dave.

She is triggered into going to see Ramsey one day several weeks after her meeting with Jonathon Whitley. Nothing more was said about the stick people letter – as she now refers to it – till he again asked to see her. He came straight to the point. The City Tribune had been on to him. They were asking questions about Susan and some indecent sexual encounter with a church minister. She sat looking at Jonathon, saying that this was like a nightmare. She did not comment on the sexual encounter. Instead, she asked Jonathon how they had picked up the story.

“Another letter, apparently, like the last one. It was anonymous but it was probably from Ramsey. And, Susan, I understand that it was recent.”

“He’s still writing them? What do we do, Jonathon?” her choice of the word ‘we’ was deliberate – to unite Jonathon and her against the common enemy.

“Well, as far as the paper is concerned, I think I’ve dealt with them. I threatened all sorts of dire consequences if they dared to print anything that could be considered libellous and I warned them not to believe the ravings of a suicidal nutcase. You know the sort of thing. I threw in the ‘every confidence in our Presenter’ bit, of course.”

“Thanks, Jonathon. Do you think I should go to the police?” She knew what he would say but her question sounded good. She was prepared to take action and so seemed to have nothing to hide. Bill told her that letters like this could be deemed to be a breach of the peace so a complaint to the police was a possibility.

“Up to you, of course, but you could just be drawing more attention to the whole business. He’s probably done his worst now. First he went to the TV Company and then to the press. I’m not sure he has anywhere else to go.”

Susan saw the logic. She also saw that Jonathon would want this kept quiet. He almost said as much when he told her that he had no choice but to speak up the line to the Board. Susan knew from his expression that the support was not as unreserved from their higher echelons as it was from Jonathon. She understood perfectly.

She deliberates on her own for two days before deciding that she should confront Ramsey. In these two days, she imagines all the worst things that could happen if she does nothing. She could get letter after letter from Ramsey. Or he might write to others, those letters going God knows where. He could get in touch with Bill again. He could draw the press directly to himself. Worst, he could be out of hospital and be a real physical threat to her. She thought that he was a wimp and a coward but a mentally unstable person can do anything. She needed to be safe in every sense. She would see him and thereby make attack her best form of defence.

She rings Brenda to check out the situation. How is she? She is so sorry not to have been in touch but she has been very busy. How is Dave? Is he home now? She sounds vaguely surprised to hear that the man is still in hospital. Brenda sounds as depressed as her husband is. Susan offers to meet her for coffee and chooses the next day, Saturday, and once again the Café Noir.

Brenda has made an effort with her hair and makeup this morning and this seems to be in Susan’s honour. She has never been made up at the hospital. Susan settles her with a coffee as weak, at Brenda’s request, as the Cafe can provide. The young woman is desperate to tell Susan about the intervening time since they met. For Brenda, as she looks back, it has all been a haze. It is clear that Dave is struggling with some unspoken weight on his shoulders. Brenda, for her part, asks him nothing but looks after the practicalities of fresh underwear, toiletries and pyjamas. She tidies the cubicle on the psychiatric ward and keeps flowers fresh and watered. Without saying anything, Dave has made it clear that any attempt at breaking through the barrier of silence that he has erected is futile and so she contents herself with talking about the things in the outside world that she feels will interest him. She brought magazines from the church and told him about the Sunday sermons that the Reverend Graham gave whilst he was in hospital. It was announced from the pulpit that Dave was taken ill quite suddenly and for the moment was too ill for visitors but the good wishes and prayers of the congregation were sent to him.

Brenda still has no idea what is behind the suicide attempt. Nor does either set of parents. If Dave is now talking to the psychiatric team, she is not being told. She has had a couple of sessions with the social worker, Ann. A nice woman, she thinks, but she always asks difficult and personal questions.

Brenda looks at Susan over her coffee, obviously thinking about saying something.

“Go on, Brenda. What is it?” Susan encourages her.

“It’s just that, well, I could be tempted just to walk away, you know. Ann keeps asking me about our private life and she seems to be suggesting there’s something wrong with it.”

“Is there? It’s not uncommon, you know.” Susan wonders what Brenda will say in response to such a straight-to-the-point question. But she asks it in a gentle voice, encouraging Brenda to feel safe enough to be open with her.

“Well, I don’t really know what’s normal, if you know what you mean. I’ve never refused him or anything like that. It’s just that I don’t really like it very much. He complains that I just lie there. Isn’t that what you’re meant to do, Susan?”

Brenda’s description of her sex life with Dave comes as no surprise. But Susan is not about to be sex counsellor – that is something she can well leave to Ann. It is clear that Dave must have been bemoaning his lot to the psychiatrist. She diverts Brenda’s question with a smile of sympathy and a comment that Dave is lucky to have her. Is she serious about walking away?

“No. Not really, I suppose. But sometimes these last few weeks, I’ve thought how nice it would be to just go on in the flat by myself. I don’t really know who Dave is any more. I thought that we were just an ordinary couple. Then there was the suicide and now these questions about sex. If I could afford to be on my own, I might. But all I could do would be to go back to Mum and Dad and that would be worse than being with Dave. Anyway, they are very fond of him and I couldn’t really do it. And his parents would be furious. It’s going to be bad enough for him when he comes out from hospital.”

“What about his work when he’s well?”

“He won’t be allowed back to the Cathedral for a while. He’s to go and do some administration work, researching and tidying the archives. Reverend Graham has arranged it. He needs to be quite better before he works with the congregation again. So I couldn’t think about leaving, could I?”

Poor, mousy Brenda, Susan thinks.

“Poor Brenda,” she says. “What can I do?”

“Nothing, Susan. I just can’t believe that you have been so kind to us.”

“Brenda,” Susan asks, as if the thought has just occurred to her, “Might I go and see Dave in hospital? Just to have a chat and see if I can help at all.”

Brenda’s face lights with surprise and delight. She would be very grateful.

With a few directions about how to find the ward and what the visiting times are, she leaves Brenda, promising to be back in touch. Perhaps she leaves Brenda with too clear an impression that she is about to somehow save their marital situation. But her way is clear to being seen in the hospital, without it looking odd to Brenda.

CHAPTER 11

She chooses the next afternoon, as she knows that Brenda visits over her lunchtime and in the evenings. She does not forewarn Dave. She just turns up at the reception and asks for directions to the ward. She is vaguely surprised at the building. It looks more like a hotel foyer than a hospital. Off to the left of the reception desk is a café bar, and to the right, shops with flowers, cards and newspapers. There is even a row of bank dispensers. She knows that there must be locked wards somewhere on this campus, but this is a far cry from the Victorian image she was carrying in her mind.

She is directed down several corridors, all brightly lit, and opening out at various points onto patios with garden seats. The ward itself is open through double glass doors. A central sitting area with the mandatory television and a dining area to the side make it remarkably like an ordinary residence. Only the workstation and office behind it say that this is a hospital.

A man in civilian clothes comes from behind the station to greet her. She informs him with a degree of assertiveness that is meant to suggest that she will not take no for an answer that she has come to see Dave Ramsey. The young man, a big, no-nonsense type, but pleasant as well, smiles at her. The label on his lapel announces that he is a nurse named Joe. Dave is in his own room. Joe will go and find him if she would like to sit down. He will ask Dave if he wants a visit from her. He takes her name.

She waits for what seems like too long. Dave must be refusing. If there is a problem, the male nurse does not let that be evident. Instead, he says that Dave was in the shower. He will be out in a moment. Why does she not sit over in the corner, where they can talk in privacy? She knows that she is not being allowed to see him in his room – perhaps for her own protection. From the wrath she is feeling towards Ramsey as she waits, it is perhaps he who is at risk.

She waits and Dave finally comes down the side corridor towards her. He looks very different from how she saw him either as a so-called lover or in the renal unit. He has lost weight and is pale. His eyes are haunted as if he is afraid not just of her but also of life itself. Presumably he is on medication. His gait is slow.

She sees at a glance that this is likely to be an encounter rather than a meeting. And it is likely to be brief at that. Despite dulled eyes, dulled presumably by pills, there is an overt hostility in Dave’s demeanour and expression. As he comes towards her, she finds herself wondering how she could have allowed this great gangling oaf of a man anywhere near her in the past. It is a thought that she conceals behind a smile suitable for a hospital visit. She stands up. She knows she feels disadvantaged whilst seated.

“What are you doing here?” He comes to a stop about three yards from her, making no move to come any closer.

She rallies; coming closer to him to break the second of confrontation but not so close that he could touch her. Her smile is all but gone now. She is cool but not unpleasant.

“I wanted to see how you are and to have a word with you about something.”

“Why have you been seeing Brenda?”

This surprises her. She somehow imagined that Brenda would not have said anything. Behind Dave, she can see Joe scrutinising a clipboard. In reality, he is observing them. She raises her voice to audible and adopts a compassionate smile.

“I’ve been very concerned about you, Dave – about you and Brenda.”

For a second, a look of fleeting doubt passes over Dave’s face. She takes her opportunity and sits down on one of the pine-framed armchairs. He stands for a second and then sits opposite her.

“How are you, Dave?”

“Depressed. How do you imagine I am?”

“What treatment are you having?”

“I see the shrink. And there’s a group. It’s on just now. I didn’t feel like it. I could do with being out of here but they won’t let me.”

Then he rounds on her.

“This is all your fault.”

“What is, Dave?

“The pills. Being here. The church.”

“The church? I thought your colleague, Reverend Graham, was helping you? I thought you were talking to him?”

“I see him a lot. If it weren’t for him, I’d have been thrown out of the church because I slept with you, and because I tried to kill myself. I’ve lost my job, thanks to you, but at least they’re going to find something for me to do. That’s because Brian Graham spoke up for me.”

She raises her eyebrows in unspoken surprise. She wants to give Joe the impression that she has no idea what Dave can be talking about.

“I’m sorry about your job, Dave.” She needs Dave to believe her and she is not ready for his next reaction.

“Sorry? How can you say that? You’re the one who told them about us in the first place.”

She just looks at him, momentarily taken aback.

“I told the church? Is that what you think?”

“Of course. I’m no fool. You don’t think I’d have attempted suicide otherwise, do you?”

She is stunned. Ramsey took the pills, believing she had told the church about them

“That’s rubbish, Dave. I told no one.”

She remembers the listening nurse.

“I mean, I told no one anything. What are you talking about, Dave?”

He does not believe her. She can see that. He rounds on her again, his voice now loud enough to be heard across the room. He is the personification of love made angry, of love turned to hate. He sneers out the words.

“Do you know, I think about you. But it is like an aberration on my part, what I felt for you. You are an ice maiden, Susan Blakely, a cold, frozen ice maiden. You destroyed something in me, something that could have been good and special for both of us. You only ever pretended. I see that now. You were indifferent from day one. And you humiliated me. You humiliated me by using me. No wonder I wanted to die. No wonder I’m depressed. I could tell you what I’d like to do to you and you wouldn’t like it, I can tell you.”

She feels cold – rigid with the crushing attack, worried that the nurse must have overheard. But she does not want to provoke Dave despite the real threat that he has just issued.

“It’s over, Dave. Just accept that.” She whispers the words.

She tries to remain calm, and smiles over at the nurse.

“It was all very unfortunate but it’s over. Leave it alone now. You need to move on with your life.” Again, she makes sure the nurse can not hear her.

“Yes. It is over. And it’s over at no cost to you, Susan. It’s cost me my job. And unless I tell Brenda and ask her forgiveness the church is unlikely to have me preach again. That’s what I’m told, anyway, by Brian Graham.”

“Tell Brenda? Dave, is that wise? What good would it do?” As Susan says this, she knew that her words will hold no sway in comparison with those of Brian Graham. Brenda will be told. Dave’s words confirm this.

“I won’t have God’s forgiveness unless I do tell her.”

Susan switches tack. Her voice is at an ordinary level now.

“Dave, these anonymous letters have got to stop.”

He eyes her, expressionless.

“What letters?”

“Come on, Dave. I mean it.” She makes a tactical error now, as she utters her next sentence. She knows it as soon as she speaks, but it is too late.

“Don’t deny it, Dave. I’m warning you. These letters must stop.”

He is up, standing over her.

“You? You are warning me? How dare you?”

The nurse is over and by his side. He was quick and he is calm.

“Steady, Dave. Steady.”

Dave crumbles immediately, sinking back into his chair.

All concern now, Susan says,

“I’m sorry, Dave. I really did not mean to upset you.”

Dave waves his hand in dismissal, his eyes to the ground. Susan looks at the nurse.

“I’ll go. I’m so sorry. Dave, you take care of yourself.” She starts towards the door.

The nurse follows her to the exit.

“He’s not well, is he?” she says, sympathetically.

“Well, we have a long way to go yet.” The nurse is inscrutable.

“But that outburst was so unlike Dave.”

Joe smiles.

“We have been working with him on assertiveness. You know, how not to be a passive victim in life.” He looks at her carefully. Susan can only guess at what the psychiatric team knows and at how much the nurse overheard. She will not be visiting this ward again.

As she walks down the corridor, she decides that she needs to steady her nerves before she drives. She chooses an indifferent cup of coffee from the dispenser in the café bar and sits over it, dwelling on whether it was a mistake to come here. On balance, she concludes not. She has learned a few things; not least that Dave blamed her, firstly for the affair and secondly for breaching that information to his employer, the church. As long as he believes that and remains in this volatile state, he poses a real threat to her. She has not spoken to the church. So who has? She has told no one. So, did Dave speak to someone before the suicide attempt? If not he, then who? Not Brenda, obviously. And now he is about to tell Brenda – Brenda whom she has befriended over these last weeks. How will Brenda react?

Has he told the truth about the anonymous letters? He must have been lying. No matter who else knows, this surely has to be the work of his depressed and deranged mind.

It is an uncomfortable time in the hours after her visit. She is very tempted to go the police and suggest that they should treat Ramsey as a possible threat and as a stalker. But something stops her. She decides instead to cover her tracks with Brenda, hopefully before Dave sees her this evening at visiting time.

At five o’clock, she is outside the University Department of Divinity where Brenda is a secretary. Susan remembers Brenda telling her how she was so lucky to get the job when Dave started his post-graduate studies. It meant they could have the occasional lunch together. She emerges right on five o’clock, out through the swing doors and down the sweeping stairs that lead from the imposing stone fascia of the building behind. Susan presses the car horn to attract her over to the car. She has come to offer Brenda a lift to the hospital and to tell her about her visit to Dave.

He really is quite unwell is he not? Obviously, he is very depressed and, Susan wonders, is he also a little bit deluded? He seems to have suggested that he and Susan had a thing going in the past. It was strange, wasn’t it? But he is in good hands from what she has seen of the staff. And what a nice place the hospital is.

She is sure that Brenda has no need to worry. It will all end up fine in the end. She will ring in a while to see how things are. As she says all this, she watches the road, but casts the occasional glance at Brenda. The young woman just looks surprised and shocked at her comments about Dave. But she seems to take it all in, hook, line and sinker. And, Susan thinks, as she drives off, it really is best that Dave’s confession to his little wife, as and when it comes, falls on deaf ears. She is doing their marriage a favour. Brenda will never believe him now.

She tells no one about her visit to the hospital. She might have said something to Linda but academic pressures mean that her friend is preoccupied with the end of term and with writing up her book. Susan knows how compelling the business of writing is and has to accept that Linda simply does not have time to join her for a meal. In one phone call, she does tell Linda about the press call from the City Tribune to the TV Company and Linda listens carefully as Susan tells her that she thinks that her boss has handled it and that it has been stopped.

She gives Bill the same account about the second letter. This seems to have the effect of him becoming protective again and his moodiness disappears. His rage towards Ramsey is all good stuff as far as Susan is concerned and she finds real comfort from her otherwise lonely, frightened, almost free-floating anxiety because of it. Bill’s rage makes her feel safer.

She is at home on her own a couple of evenings after her visit to the hospital when the phone rings. She is taken aback and momentarily thrown off guard to hear Ramsey’s voice.

“Susan? Good. I thought that you might like to know. The press are on to you. They’ve just left. They want my story, Susan. I’m going to give them it.”

She gathers her thoughts.

“Don’t be such a bloody fool. They will shred us both.”

“I’ve nothing to lose, Susan. You have, though.”

“Oh yes you have, Dave. You have a great deal to lose. You have your career to lose for one. Do you think the church will keep you on, even in a back room job, if this comes out? Well, do you? And do you think Brenda and her parents could stand it if you are smeared across the tabloids? Think about it Dave.”

There is a long silence, and then the phone goes dead.

CHAPTER 12

“It may not be the easiest of evenings, Darling.”

Linda and Ken are in their bedroom, showering and changing in preparation for an evening with Susan and Bill. Theirs is a larger than average, dignified room which overlooks the front garden through two large windows. A king size bed dominates the room and a sofa sits along the wall opposite, between the window recesses. It is a square room, pale cream in colour and offset by dark mahogany furniture. At one end of the room is the en-suite bathroom and at the other, their walk-in dressing room. The soft furnishings are in cream or white, increasing the sense of space.

Linda is sitting at their dressing table, which is set to the left of the bed, adjusting her bra strap as she and Ken prepare to go out for the evening.

“I gather that,” mutters Ken. “I can tell by your mood.”

“I’m not in a mood,” Linda retorts. “Just a bit anxious, that’s all.”

Linda has worried as to how the evening will go ever since she accepted the invitation to have dinner with Susan and Bill at Number Twelve – the latest restaurant to catch the attention of discerning food lovers in the city.

“I don’t suppose you would like to tell me what this is all about?” Ken asks, kissing his wife on the forehead and waiting for a reply.

“There’s not much to tell,” Linda replies, peering into the mirror at her eye make-up.

“Come on, Linda, since that night when you got out of bed and disappeared for several hours over to Susan’s you have been behaving quite secretly over your phone calls to her.”

“I honestly don’t think there’s much to worry about, Ken. That love-struck minister, Dave Ramsey was pestering Susan. The man turns out to be mentally unbalanced. He attempted suicide, he’s still in psychiatric care and he’s now threatening to go to the press.”

“I see. So, she’s scared of the publicity?”

“Exactly. She’s also jumpy about Bill not believing her. But he seems to have taken her word for it that it was basically nothing to do with her.”

“Mm. I thought she wasn’t too wild about poor old Bill?”

“Well, she’s not besotted but she’s hardly indifferent either. I suppose,” Linda continues, looking now in the mirror at Ken, “It wouldn’t be a bad thing if she settled with Bill, though. She could do a lot worse than make a commitment to him.”

“Couldn’t agree more. This chap – the minister – sounds pretty ill to me. Obsession, I’d say, not love, that’s for sure.” Ken adjusts his tie. “What kind of state is he in now? What was the suicide method?”

“Paracetemol – a heavy dose, I gather.” Linda knows her husband understands the attempt was serious. “It was touch and go for a while. Anyway, it could, as I say, be a difficult evening. Let’s get going, shall we? Would you try to have a word with Bill and see what he’s making of it?”

Ken just looks at her, raises his eyebrows with a mock exasperated sigh and they head downstairs together to give Tina the telephone number of the restaurant and to bid her goodnight. They spend ten minutes with the children and then leave by taxi.

The restaurant is Italian, smart and with none of the pseudo-Italian paraphernalia of middle bracket restaurants. It is the kind of restaurant you might find in better hotels in the expensive areas of Rome. White tablecloths, dimmed lighting and waiters in evening dress all suggest that the restaurant will be a pleasant experience. When she eats well, Linda likes traditional styles in a restaurant and is not one for the new minimalist restaurants springing up over the city.

The couple sit over gins in the lounge area and allow themselves five minutes of silently browsing the menu as they wait for their friends to arrive.

When Susan and Bill enter the restaurant, Linda’s first reaction is that her friend looks stressed and tired behind the makeup and bright smile. Bill, by contrast, looks relaxed and genuinely cheerful. The women hug and then Linda kisses Bill, Susan following suit with Ken. General conversation ensues with enthusiasm for Bill’s suggestion to spend the evening together, updating of their varied day’s work and the usual polite enquiries about the children.

Susan and Bill order gins and they all give another few minutes over to concentrating on the menu, interspersed with cheerful humour from Ken and the headwaiter’s advice on the specialities of the evening.

The men both choose mussels to start with, Linda a smoked salmon and cream pasta dish and Susan avocado baked with crab soufflé. For main courses, they select the evening’s special of fillet steaks with Italian tomato and garlic sauce. Bill selects a red wine in consultation with Ken, and Linda watches her friend’s mild irritation at this male preserve being shared by their two partners.

The evening is pleasant, though. In the company of four they find conducive and intelligent conversation on most of the topics they touch on. They can share a humorous look at politics, despite their different outlooks and they find common entertainment in the current satirical TV coverage of politics.

No one particularly wants desert and they settle on cheese and coffee, with port for Ken and Bill. The women cry off from having any more to drink at this stage. Over cheese, the conversation turns to Dave Ramsey. Linda, having spoken with Susan in the day, knows that Ramsey is still posing a risk of exposure to her. So her question is carefully timed and phrased. She also knows, although nothing has been said, that Susan is anticipating it.

“Susan, how is Ramsey doing?”

“He’s still pretty deranged from what I can gather. Must be dreadful for the wife.”

Bill comes in as if what he is about to say is already rehearsed.

“Indeed. It’s not been too good for Susan either.” Now he is looking at Ken. “Susan could do without this sort of thing. There’s nothing worse than false allegations.”

Ken takes the implicit message that this is to be the perceived truth for the future.

“Yes. This is a difficult situation for you, Susan. I suppose the problem is that if this comes out it will be hard to refute. Don’t you legal boys say that it’s impossible to prove a negative? You can’t prove that something did not happen.”

Linda frowns at Ken. He is teasing and mocking Susan and doing it in such a way that is almost indiscernible. But she knows her husband. Fortunately, if Bill knows what Ken is doing, he does not pick up the jibe.

“Quite. If this gets to the press, people will draw their own conclusions, irrespective of the facts.” Bill offers the cheese board round as he speaks.

“If any,” laughs Susan, coming in for the first time. Then, serious now, she continues. “Bill has been great, you know – very supportive.”

By this, Linda decides that Bill obviously believes his partner. The unspoken invitation to Ken is obviously to do the same. Linda says nothing; thereby able to ensure that she does not betray either Ken or Susan. Instead, she asks whether there is anything that Susan can or should do. She chooses her words carefully, not sure how much Bill knows about the call from Ramsey. But Bill seems to be quite conversant. He has suggested a solicitor’s letter and constructed it himself, leaving it for Susan’s own solicitor to send. Ramsey will receive it tomorrow. Linda is impressed. Here is Susan using the advice of her betrayed partner to deal with the unwanted behaviours of a jilted lover. Only Susan would have thought of that one.

The conversation moves on as if naturally, Bill closing the topic with an observation of how vulnerable anyone in the public eye can be.

Later, when Susan rises to go to the ladies, Linda accompanies her, partly to talk to her friend, partly to leave Ken to talk with Bill. Susan updates her in the otherwise deserted rest room – as the sign on the door titles the facility.

“Jonathon Whitley has been great. After he got the letter from Ramsey, he showed it to me. It’s pretty lurid. He’s doing all he can to suppress it. He says it’s not in the public interest to discredit public personalities with mad ravings of the mentally ill. The boss has held off the City Tribune, as well.”

“Have you told him what did happen?”

“Good God, no! And he has been very careful not to ask. Cleverly done.”

“I take it you are still denying it to Bill?”

“Yes. I couldn’t bring myself to say anything. I think I’m going to let sleeping dogs lie. Anyway, it’s too late now to go back on the line I took.”

“Was the letter to the boss true – or accurate – whatever the right word is?”

Susan looks long and hard in the mirror at her friend.

“Linda, will you keep this to yourself? I need to talk to someone.”

“Of course – we have been friends and confidantes since London days. We’ve not let each other down yet.”

Susan hesitates before she speaks. She is slightly the worse for wear from wine and Linda wonders if she should stop whatever divulgence is about to follow. But the moment when she might do that passes.

“It was pretty wild sex. Anonymous sex. I made him do pretty well whatever I wanted.”

Linda looks stunned. Then she rallies.

“You mean, Susan, like you see in the top shelf selection in video shops? Or, I gather, on the Net?” She is laughing, surprised and eyes wide open.

“Sort of. Linda, it’s like an aberration. It kind of comes over me when I know I’ll get away with it. It’s a bit like a drug. I’ve got to do it.”

Linda chooses laughter.

“My God, a nympho! My best friend’s a nympho. Well, well! Who’d have thought it? She is hugging her friend to take the sting out of what she says by doing so. The hug is one of woman-to-woman acceptance.

Now they both see the funny side and shrieks of laughter must be heard all the way back to the table. They are shrieks of relief from Susan; of semi-embarrassment from Linda.

“Now I see why you haven’t mentioned this to Bill. Mind you,” Linda chokes, sobering slightly, “This makes you vulnerable.” Now a new thought occurs to her as if a penny drops. “I gather this is not the only time?”

Susan just raises her eyebrows and shakes her head.

“No. That’s the problem.”

“Is money involved?” Linda asks, her eyes widening as a new thought occurs to her.

“Good God, no,” Susan retorts, as if there ire some vast moral divide between her behaviour and that of any common or garden prostitute.

“Oh dear, Susan.” Linda gives a more restrained laugh that suggests that this is quite serious. Well,” she says next, thinking as quickly as the wine allows, “I suggest we keep this to ourselves as far as Ken and Bill are concerned. Let’s just hope that Ramsey keeps quiet and that we ride out this little storm.”

Susan hugs her, obviously wanting to talk more now that she has told this to anyone for the first time but saying instead that they should get back to the men. As they are leaving the rest room, Linda whispers, “Soon, let’s talk some more. I might have a thing or two to tell you myself.”

Later, as she and Ken are getting ready for bed, she asks how he got on with Bill.

“I still think he’s one nice bloke,” Ken reflects. “He seems to have taken Susan’s account of this Ramsey business at face value. Seems intent on getting her through it. He still says that he would like them to get together permanently.”

“I take it you don’t – take Susan at face value, I mean,” Linda said, settling down in her side of the bed, and flying a kite as she does so to see what Ken will say.

“Of course I do, Darling. Oh, and Darling”, he grins, leaning over. “Are my ears wet, where I washed them, of course?”

They laugh, put the light out and despite the alcohol, find enough energy for some admittedly non-energetic lovemaking.

CHAPTER 13

The end of term for academics at Linda’s level tends to be a very busy time of planning, reviewing and preparing for the following year’s work. Pressure to complete the exam process, to meet external examiners and to review the funding base for the year ahead keep staff working at full pace till the end of term. There are meetings, graduation ceremonies and formal working lunches. All of this ensures that despite the empty lecture halls, the work continues right into early July. To the students sitting on the lawns in the early summer sun, this is an unknown part of academic life.

It is a long-standing tradition for Linda and Ken to host a garden party in the reasonably extensive grounds of their home. They do this at the end of each of Linda’s academic years, and colleagues from University and the health centre and a few other friends and neighbours are invited.

This year, they choose a Saturday, late afternoon and evening, just three days after their meal with Susan and Ken. Given the number of children in the party, they organise a bouncy castle and a children’s entertainer. This is duly set up at some remove from the patio and its presence gives the adults a welcome chance to relax without worrying about the noise and behaviour of their offspring. The great, rambling and walled garden lends itself perfectly to this kind of entertainment and the day proves to be warm and sunny, the temperatures hovering in the mid twenties.

Ken is in charge of the barbecue. The patio doors are open, leading from the garden into a dining room laden with wine and beers, soft drinks and a cold table, which Linda overhears described as ‘to die for’. This she later recounts to Tina who worked into the small hours with Linda to make the buffet a memorable one.

On this hot and sunny day, the mood is relaxed and happy as friends and acquaintances meet and as conversation flows. Close friends of Linda help to keep the buffet looking attractive and Bill is given the task of keeping the glasses of the guests topped up. Young Kenny is in charge of children’s drinks and manages his responsibility for a solid hour before the attractions of a rough and tumble on the castle win the day.

In the tradition of successful parties, Linda and Ken’s guests move from group to group, enjoying general social repartee, some exchange of information about the different professional worlds they live in and some talk of the summer to come. There is always something topical to share about city life – this month, the possibility that a new hypermarket on the edge of the by-pass will ease city traffic but threaten small retailers.

By about eight o’clock, guests with younger children drift off whilst Linda and Ken’s children take over from the entertainer and each hosts the older boys and girls. Somewhere in the house, girls are dressing up and boys are absorbed in some computer game. The adults are mellowed now by wine and good food and sit in quiet circles, talking easily and a bit lazily.

Not allowing herself wine till now, Linda relaxes at last on the grass watching Ken, chef’s apron still on, who is chatting with Bill and Alistair, his legal partner. Harry, Jane’s brother, is with them. They assembled at the barbecue an hour before and are still deep in conversation. Linda guesses the chat will be about their golfing plans for the summer and the prospect for the city rugby team in the next season.

She and Susan chatted for a while earlier on, steering clear of the subject of Ramsey. Linda sensed that Susan wanted a day off from that topic and from the anxiety that goes with it. Susan, gregarious at times like these, did the rounds of Linda’s friends, careful to mix as well with friends of Ken. On these occasions, Susan avoids talk of her personality status, preferring to learn more about other people and their worlds. She did allow herself to get drawn into a conversation with a couple of medics about the representation of hospitals in TV soaps, but otherwise enjoyed discussing with men from the business school their views on the success and further potential of E-commerce. She talked with Terry, a computer expert, sufficiently knowledgeable to make the point that the only expert in computers is the computer itself. She said afterwards to Linda that he was a bright young man and not the anorak one normally associates with the world of information technology. She asked who he was and Linda explained that he came along with Jane and her brother Harry.

Watching her, Linda realizes that Susan veers automatically to male company and is the centre of attention to the men in any group. Not exactly flirting, she seems none the less to hold centre court with the men. Linda wonders if she would have noticed this prior to their conversation in the rest room at the Italian restaurant. She thinks not.

Jane comes over to join Linda for the first time since she arrived after a few pleasantries with Ken and her two male escorts for the evening. She sits down now beside her hostess and they talk easily together for twenty minutes or so about their respective plans for the time leading up to the dig in the Hebrides. Jane is going out to Turkey, partly to rest and read in the sun, partly to visit ancient sites for her own interest. And she hopes to have a few days with friends in the city. She has a couple of evenings planned with her women friends.

As they chat, Linda watches Jane’s eyes, sparkling with life and enthusiasm and holding contact with Linda’s. Jane’s attention to her feels warm and she enjoys these moments. For her part, she tells Jane, she will spend the first part of the summer at home with the kids until they go abroad and she then joins Jane at the dig. After the dig, she will be flying to Santiago di Compostela from where she will drive over the mountains to join Ken at the family home.

Jane turns the conversation to the dig and comments that she is looking forward to being in the Hebrides with Linda – and with the others, of course.

Linda returns Jane’s look as the younger woman seems to somehow search beyond her eyes, into her soul.

“Yes, I am too.”

Nothing more is said, but the moment holds them both. There is an undefined intimacy about their exchange as they sit together on the lawn. Linda is seeking and giving information. Jane is doing the same. It is superficial at one level; significant at another.

The silence between them is only broken a few seconds later when Terry joins them. They both turn to incorporate him into their conversation, indicating that they are talking about their summers to come.

Terry – tall, fit and bursting with energy – is obviously an admirer of Jane. He comes in with his own plans in which it was clear that he hopes to spend time with Jane. Jane just smiles.

They chat a while longer, Linda only partly hearing Terry’s enthusiasm about white water rafting which he hopes to do in the States as soon as possible. He hopes that Jane will join him. Again, Jane just smiles. Linda catches Susan’s eye across the garden and indicates to her to join them. She wants to introduce Jane.

Jane seems to warm at once to Susan and asks interested questions about what it is like to host a TV human-interest show like Susan’s. Laughing at herself, she admits that she is trying to conceal the fact that, as a very infrequent watcher of TV, she has barely ever seen Susan on the screen. But it is clear that no offence is meant and none taken. Susan just laughs. Jane is even able to kindle a spark of genuine interest in Susan about the Iron Age village they will be unearthing later in the summer. Linda says there could be a newsworthy story to come from it and Susan raises an acknowledging eyebrow. A word from Susan to the evening news team might be very useful indeed.

Ken joins them, then Bill and Harry, and the larger group sit at ease for half an hour or so whilst Linda wanders round her other guests enjoying their company. She is relieved, though, as people begin to trickle away, making their thanks and goodbyes.

By late evening, only their close friends remain, together with Harry, Terry and Jake – an unmarried doctor with his eye on Susan. Susan is not dissuading him. Linda wonders how the evening will pan out there and whether she will hear more about this at some later date. Amused and vaguely resigned to this new side to Susan, she offers to make coffee. Jane gets up immediately to help. Linda does not protest.

In the kitchen, though, as she sets the coffee filter to run, she is conscious of how awkward she now feels, alone in the presence of this young woman who is stirring feelings that she has been struggling with since the evening of the supper party with her and her women friends.

“Linda.” Jane says, looking straight at her.

Linda looks up from the table where she is pouring milk into a jug and holds Jane’s eye contact. She is about to say ‘Yes?’ when a sound from the door makes both of them turn round. Ken stands there, smiling, but with a questioning, almost puzzled expression. He seems to sense that he has walked in on something.

“Am I interrupting?”

“Not at all,” Jane says, returning the smile. “It really has been a great day. You have such a nice home. Thank you both so much for sharing it with Harry and me.”

Linda smiles, relieved at the aplomb with which Jane has carried off the moment and says nothing except, “Coffee’s ready,” and then, with a slow glance at Jane, leads the way back to the others.

The evening ends, Ken and Linda graciously receiving the thanks of their guests. Jane sidesteps Terry’s attentions, Linda notices, and leaves with Harry and by taxi. Susan leaves with Bill. Even for Susan, caution seems to be the greater part of valour. Somewhere deep inside Linda, she finds she is fighting a puritanical urge to judge and condemn her friend.

The next days for Linda are mainly child focussed. She takes Angela and Kenny, now on their school vacation, on daytrips and picnics, and entertains them with their friends in the house or garden. She acts as driver to their increasingly busy social diaries. It is a time of year that she relishes and Ken takes a day off when he can. On these days, they drive to the hills and walk and barbecue by running streams. It is a gentle time though Linda realizes that it is also, for her, a restless time.

She hears little from Susan but receives a call at home in mid July. There has been no reaction from Ramsey to the solicitor’s letter and, as Linda realizes herself, no press exposé. So, it obviously looks as if she is going to survive. The whole thing stands a good chance of staying out of the public eye. Susan is clearly relieved She now assumes, Linda realises, that the potential crisis is over. Her life, professionally speaking, can go on as before. Linda forbears to ask if Susan saw any more of young doctor Jake from the garden party.

She does, though, ask how Susan’s boss is with her. He always seemed a remote figure to Linda, as if the relationship between Susan and him is distant. Linda cannot even remember his name. She says so. Susan comes back; Whitley is a good, strictly business-like sort of boss. He is also very exacting and demanding of her work. Susan likes that in a boss - as long as the boss is a man. And, she says, it is a relationship of mutual respect for their different abilities and one that could never be close in any personal sense. Jonathon knows she is good at her job and he will promote her in the interests of the TV Company. He will also protect her for the same reason. Anyway, she adds, as if this is important, he is at least fifteen years her senior. He also never gossips about one member of the team to another so what he knows stays with him. He has little time for some of the new young bosses above him so he is using his own discretion as best he can with regard to the letter and its circulation within the company. He has had to pass it up the line, but he is exercising caution as to precisely who is seeing it. Susan accepts his judgement. Jonathon is a true politician in the organisation.

“Will he have kept it, do you think?” Linda probes.

“I would expect so. It’s probably on my staff file. He keeps a file on each of us. It’s not likely to go to the main personnel file – too many admin staff have access. It’s a pity that it just can’t be binned but there’s nothing I can do about it. He would think I wasn’t trusting him if I asked for it.”

“How’s Bill taking the whole thing now?”

“OK. He’s not saying much.” This is said dismissively, as if it is now history.

Linda suggests meeting Susan for a meal before Linda flies out to the Hebrides. Susan seems to jump at the chance. They arrange a time for the next evening, as Linda is confident that Ken is free to be at home with the children.

Over their supper in the same vegetarian basement bistro as they ate in on the evening of Ramsey’s suicide attempt, Linda listens carefully and with all the sympathy that she can show as Susan describes her need for anonymous sex, sex without emotion; a need that has been a part of her driving force since her late adolescence. Linda’s response is kindly. And it is her best effort to be the kind of friend that Susan needs right now. But she wonders as she listens what she would feel about all this is she were talking to a stranger she happened to meet in a train. She suspects she might not be so generous.

Largely, she listens; she makes it clear that she has no judgment to place at her friend’s door; and she asks if her friend has any understanding of why she has this drive. Privately, and beyond her instinct to judge, she is confused. She knows that Susan has so much to lose by this behaviour. And there is so much that is already there for her in terms of attractive, available men. Why behave like this? Linda can be sympathetic but has no understanding, yet, that could help her to be truly empathetic.

Susan chooses to say only that it is compelling; that when a set of circumstances arises in her life, such as being away from her own environment, she makes herself available.

“But what about safety – from violence, I mean?”

“Well, safety is sometimes built in more by circumstances. Like someone at reception in a hotel knowing you have a guest. Or asking room service to call at a particular time. You certainly can’t assume safety in any man.”

“But was there safety on Mull because Ramsey was a minister?”

“No. No. You can’t tell who anyone is at the end of the day. No, the safety was in the fact that I told him Mike, the cameraman, knew I was invited back and where I was. Plus, The media of the country was on the doorstep. And, yes,” she concedes, “I suppose my instinct said he was safe enough.”

“And what about disease – dare I say AIDS?”

“A gamble, I suppose.” That is all Susan can say.

“Susan, I take it this is something that happens regularly?” asks Linda, still concerned for the practical issues of safety and sexual health.

“Well, not a lot, but yes, more than I care to admit. But Ramsey is the only one who has ever bothered me afterwards.”

They leave it there, Linda sensing that Susan has said as much as she can for the moment.

Straight to the point, now, with all her journalistic ability for matter of fact questioning, Susan asks Linda about herself.

“Linda, what is it that you have been hinting at that you might tell me? I take it your life is not as conventional as it looks? Is it not time that you told me?”

Linda hesitates, looks into her glass for a few seconds as she decides what to say. She raises her eyes to meet Susan’s.

“Actually, it is conventional to all intents and purposes. It’s not what I do. It’s what I feel.”

Susan waits. It is a sure technique to make someone fill a silence.

“I don’t know how to put it except that there’s a void – something I feel that I’ve never done anything about.”

“Come on, you can tell me.”

“I love Ken, don’t mistake me, but, well, I’m attracted to something else.”

“Something else? Something?” Susan laughs and teases. “Horses? Doorknobs?”

“Women.”

Silence. Then,

“I see. Well, actually, I don’t. But it happens a lot, Linda.” Then a thought seems to strike Susan.

“Linda, it’s not me, is it?” Her tone is sympathetic, if alarmed.

“No, of course not, you chump. But one of the reasons I’ve never said was in case you would think just that. No, just women I’ve met over the years.”

“And you have never done anything about them?”

“No, I haven’t. But at the moment, it’s different. And married women do have female relationships. You hear about it from time to time.”

“So, is there someone at the moment, Linda?” asks Susan with a shrewd guess as to who it will be.

“There could be, Susan. That’s why I wanted to talk it through.”

“Right,” her friend says, obviously doing mental gymnastics with the plethora of issues involved. “Well, I’m a pragmatic sort, as you know. I actually believe in following your heart in these matters. Actually,” she digresses, “I envy you. My heart is certainly not in what I have done. Nor is it in Bill, no really.” For a second, she sounds wistful. “Still, that’s not what we’re talking about right now. My advice, for what it’s worth,” she continues, “Is to go for it. But be damned careful. You have a family and a good life. Keep it secret and either find out that she’s important to you and do something about it, or have a fling and get her out of your system.”

Linda looks stunned at the precision of Susan’s views and wonders how people can see so clearly the solutions to other people’s dilemmas. She decides to leave it there. It is evident that Susan is not going to ask who the woman is. Maybe she doesn’t have to if she has listened and observed these last few weeks. Linda asks one last question.

“Susan, does this change our friendship?”

“Don’t be daft. This is very different from Ramsey and look how good you have been over that. I don’t want to be trite, Linda, but we’ve been friends too long for something that’s obviously significant to you to shake my liking of you. Quite the reverse. Actually, you seem more human, somehow. Less perfect. I love you for all that you are, Linda.”

Linda is taken aback. It is unprecedented for Susan to speak in such emotional terms. And she obviously means it. She stretches over and gives her friend’s hand a squeeze.

“You are a good friend, Susan.” She wishes she were as genuinely generous of spirit as Susan has just been. And she hopes that Susan has not picked up her underlying ambivalence about Susan’s sexual encounters.

Susan reflects for a moment, obviously on the point of saying something else.

“What?” Linda prompts, needing to continue the conversation now that it has started.

“Well, I wondered what you think is the reason for your attraction to women.”

Linda laughs, concealing her annoyance at the question.

“Come on, Susan. Does there have to be a reason, any more than there is a reason why I like chocolate bars or modern jazz? I genuinely believe that I’ve known all this as far back as I can remember. I just had no language for it all as a young girl. I’m bi-sexual and was probably born that way. It doesn’t need to be some sort of aberrant pathology, you know. No abuse, no trauma at an early age and two parents who loved my brother and me. I really had the most ordinary of childhoods. If anything, it was not being able to talk about it that was the problem.”

“Why couldn’t you talk about it? Something must have told you that it was different.”

“Yes, I suppose so. I remember that there was a girl in school. She was a few years older than me. I thought she was fabulous. It was a crush – no more than that and it passed. But somehow, I knew not to say anything. Then when I was at university there was another student. She was training to be a vet. I nearly did something then but by then I’d met Ken.”

“And you never did anything in all these years?”

“No.”

“Then all I can think, my dear Linda, is that it’s time you did. And that this is very important. My view of life is always to go for it. You know that.”

They laugh, ignoring the danger of Susan’s advice. Linda sits there, a weight removed from her shoulders by Susan’s matter of fact and permitting attitude. There the conversation ends, and the evening too, shortly afterwards.

CHAPTER 14

From then until she leaves for the Hebrides, Linda has little time for personal reflection, consumed as her time is with the practicalities of getting the children ready for their trip to the youth camp in France. Despite all their worries about the children going off like this, Linda is quite happy with the holiday company representatives whom they met before the final decision was taken. She saw Ken and the children off, quite quiet in her mind. Then she headed for the airport for the short trip over to the Hebridean island.

Jane has come from the dig site in the mini bus to the airport. She is with Hector, one of the postgraduate students, and they are already in the terminal as Linda comes through into the arrivals lounge.

Smiling and relaxed looking, Jane is tanned after her break in Turkey and looks attractive in light denims and white shirt – a way of dressing that shows Jane’s figure to advantage. Linda notices that her younger colleague has lost some weight over these weeks. The three of them smile in greeting, Linda doing no more than touching Jane on the arm – this, after all, is professional, even if in the most informal of settings.

Hector, Linda notices, is more than taken with Jane. He is a fresh faced, blonde young man, with serious eyes and a tall slim physique. He chats to Jane nineteen to the dozen on the mini-bus trip to the hostel. Work will resume the next day, Jane advises, as the three sit in the front of the van, Linda in the middle and Hector driving. Jane points out various landmarks as they drive, suggesting there is plenty to explore as time permits. She seems to Linda to be excited and not to be concealing her pleasure at seeing her.

Linda, for her part, behaves calmly and is equally friendly to both her escorts.

The hostel is all she feared. Partitions separate the bed cubicles, each of which has a bedside cabinet and an open cupboard. There are six beds to a room and communal showers and toilets, one for the men, one for the women. She does not conceal her horror as Jane gives her a guided tour. The kitchen facilities are at least clean and modern. Jane laughs in amusement and says Linda has the privilege of being boss and can always go off to the hotel. Linda declines, asserting that she will brave it with the rest. After all, Jane has done so for the last fortnight. Thank God, she thinks, and then says, for the comfort to come of the last weekend in the town hotel.

Their party more or less fills the hostel. Only four beds remain and these will be occupied over the days by a variety of young tourists and back packers of different nationalities. The team sit together over supper a couple of hours later as a special meal to mark Linda’s arrival is produced – cold crab and crusty bread, followed by a beef casserole. Litre flagons of wine, red and white, are placed down the centre of the table.

It is a pleasant evening, the chatter bright, warm and friendly. Linda can see that Jane has done a good job of leading the team cohesion. After the main course, and over some local cheese, they put time aside to bring Linda up to date on their work at the dig. Linda already knows most of the significant facts from Jane, but Jane lets the group tell the boss in their own words. The site spans at least three houses, one on top of the other and probably reflecting at least a thousand years of civilisation. A purely chance discovery during the week of a tomb in the next field is potentially the most exciting find of all. The farmer went through the top of it with his tractor as he circumvented his usual track to the farmhouse. That track is currently the dig site. The tomb is going to be opened for a first look from the outside tomorrow when Linda is present.

“Are we heading for major finds, then, Jane?” asks Linda down the table.

“We sure stand to,” Jane comes back. “Certainly, we can’t fully explore the tomb in the time we’ve got left. It may be better to wait a season, apply for more funding and come back next year. Publicity wouldn’t go amiss. It could increase the likelihood of funding.”

“Sounds good to me,” affirms Linda, watching the nods of agreement round the table. “Let’s have a first look tomorrow and decide what we do over dinner tomorrow night.”

Careful not to take over Jane’s well-established leadership, she makes it clear to the others that she and Jane will confer after the tomb is open. Jane will continue to lead the dig and she will ask for Jane’s help in working at the political and public interface of the project. This is going to involve meetings with the local authority and the tourist agency, potential funding negotiations and, of course, meeting the press. They agree that this could be a national story. An open day for local people and summer tourists should draw the local press.

Hector stays by Jane’s side all evening, helps clear up and accompanies Jane when she suggests that Linda might like to see the nearby beach before dark. Linda is happy to do so and is relieved, if anything, that Hector is with them. The beach is a quarter hour’s walk away during which Hector entertains them both to a running commentary on the flora and fauna of the island. This keeps the conversation light and Hector seems quietly pleased when, on their return, Linda makes her goodnights and he has Jane to himself. Linda leaves them settling to a final glass of wine in the dining room where they are the team of two responsible for laying out the following day’s breakfast plates. As she glances back from the door, she sees Jane staring in her direction, a serious expression in her usually smiling eyes.

In her narrow bed that night, Linda lies awake listening, she knows, for the sound of Jane returning to her own cubicle next to hers, wanting to be sure that she is there.

The first evening sets the pattern for the work and days ahead. Linda sees the site and works with the team the following day. She is impressed by the thoroughness of the team’s efforts and recording under Jane’s leadership. Jane introduces her to the farmer and his wife on whose ground the site lies. They prove to be a pleasant and gentle couple, concerned only that their usual profit from their ground should not be lost to the interests of ancient history. They can cope with another season of the dig if an arrangement can be arrived at. Fair enough, Linda feels, and says so; farming is no longer the profitable world of just a few years ago.

The evenings follow a rhythm of returning to the hostel, showering, sitting over wine and discussing the finds and the events of the day. Jane and Linda also report back on negotiations going on regarding continuing the excavations and relay back the support of the tourist agency that they should hold an open day for the public, at the site, so that people can see the houses and the artefacts discovered and talk to the young archaeologists at first hand. The idea is a useful one for them. Anything that heightens interest is likely to lead to improved chances of funding. It could also improve local cooperation.

Late evenings always involve a walk of some sort – and one evening Jane and Linda walk alone, conscious of enjoying each other’s company and saying so. But they say nothing else of import. On the beach they sit in silence and watch the sun go down. Linda avoids Jane’s eyes as they enjoy the last shafts of the rays from the sun as it falls below the horizons. But she feels intensely the presence of the younger woman intensely and knows that she wants to reach out and just touch her. She does not.

On the Friday of the first week, one of the team, Tom, volunteers to be the driver and to take everyone to the hotel in town for a pub meal and an evening of music. It proves a good rowdy evening of beers, chilli-con-carnes, fish and chips and indifferent curries – standard pub fare which assumes the proportions of a feast after more modest meals in the week. The loud jukebox music and the smoky atmosphere take Linda back in her thoughts to her own student days. She feels momentarily young again, a million miles away from family life. They all laugh and talk as much as they can against the volume of music. Hector makes his move to be with Jane and to walk her to the harbour. Linda sees her decline, indicating that she is listening to the music and is amused to watch Hector go into a mild sulk for the rest of the evening. Linda keeps her distance and chats to a couple of the group who have obviously recently become an item.

The sleeping accommodation at the hostel is basic but provides the only privacy that there is for reflection. Linda lies for several evenings in the dark, fully aware now of her feelings and with the words of her conversation with Susan ringing in her head. Her calls to Ken and to the children in Europe ground her, though, and hold her steady in her resolve to say and do nothing.

On Sunday, the party agree not to work, and give themselves a day’s walking, followed by a beach barbecue. Some of the men, the rejected Hector included, brave the sea for a swim. A bonfire on the beach warms them afterwards and keeps everyone on the shore till long after sunset. Those who have become couples sit together but the majority are just content with the good spirit of people happy at work and at play. Linda and Jane catch each other’s eye from time to time across the fire and across the group. Linda has a sense that each of them is waiting.

CHAPTER 15

The second week passes in a whirl of practical last minute activity and a rush to expose as much as possible of the site right up to the very last moment. The knowledge that the site could close for the foreseeable future places an excited imperative on the group to dig as deep as the can in the time that remains.

Linda is both present on site and away at meetings during the course of the week. So often, she stops to watch the slim frame of Jane as she labours over a piece of ground or concentrates with a frown on her notes, her face usually streaked with mud where she has absent-mindedly swept her hand over her brow. Linda aches each moment when she is in the young woman’s company. She aches worse when she is not.

The open day is on Wednesday, half day closing for the shops and therefore likely to attract locals and tourists with little opportunity to spend money. A trickle of people turn up; enough, the group feel, to warrant the effort they put into the preparations. The local newspaper does an interview and the local TV station shoots some footage.

On Friday, they leave the hostel to move into the hotel, looking forward to a comfortable weekend but with sadness for a time well shared. In the event, the whole team has booked into the hotel. Most are sharing rooms. Jane and Linda have a room each. The weekend is part work, part leisure. On Friday evening, they eat pub food in the lounge as before. Now the place is alive with folk music for the Folk Festival.

Jane and Linda agree on a walk round the town and back to the hotel late in the evening. Jane suggests the walk at a moment when Hector is waylaid by one of the girls in the party, Sophie, who wants Hector to partner her in a game of pool. The two women enjoy the stroll to the harbour, awkward, almost, in each other’s company. At the end of the pier they stop, and instead of looking at the moon shadows dancing over the sea, stand and hold each other’s eyes. But neither of them says anything, Jane breaking the moment with a smile and a quiet, “let’s go back”.

At the hotel, they are each of them reluctant to separate from the other. Jane suggests a last drink in the bar and Linda thinks that the wine that she has in her room would be better – the hotel house wine is on the rough side. She has said this before she thinks about the ramifications. She digs herself in deeper – the noise is still unabated in the lounge whereas their rooms will at least allow them to talk. What is she doing, she asks herself.

They are somehow awkward as they enter Linda’s room. Linda pours the wine; gives Jane a glass. She accepts it with a smile, takes it to the bay window and sits in the armchair, sipping it and saying little. Linda sits on the bed and they talk about the evenings they have walked and the sunsets they have seen over the last ten days. Jane says how sorry she is that the time is coming to an end. With the ability of the American to express herself, she says it has been one of the most important times she has spent in her life. Linda looks at her, searching for the meaning in Jane’s words that she thinks might be there.

“Yes,” Linda comes back, cautiously. “It’s been an enormously significant project.”

Jane smiles, says that she wasn’t just thinking of the project but that it is getting late and she had perhaps better let Linda get some sleep.

She rises to go and Linda comes with her to the door. They stand silent, looking at each other once again before Jane comes to her. A charge of nervous emotion runs through Linda as she realizes that Jane is going to hug her to say goodnight. Linda holds her for the first time in her arms and does not let her go. She is aware that Jane is not pulling away. They stand together like this, slowly pulling back their heads to look at each other, close up, for the first time.

It is Jane who kisses Linda, stretching to her lips an inch or two above her own. It is tender, it is slow and it seems to last a very long time. And it is Jane who whispers, a few moments later, “I love you, Linda.”

“And I love you.”

It all happens so simply in the event. Nothing more is said. Nothing needs to be said. They sit down together on the bed for a long time, holding each other, kissing, just experiencing this emotion and the feel of the other in her arms. The feel of a woman is new to Linda but because it is Jane, it is also perfect. There is nothing strange about it. Her closeness is almost overwhelming. In the minutes they laugh quietly in recognition of what they are feeling, Linda knowing that no words could convey her feelings.

Eventually, Jane, usually the more vocal of the two anyway, says, “I have loved you for a very long time, Linda.”

Linda is taken aback, genuinely surprised. “Have you? But we didn’t really know each other before this fortnight.”

Jane thinks before replying.

“I suppose the fortnight just confirmed it for me.”

Linda muses, “I don’t know when it dawned on me. It was gradual, I think. I was very conscious of you at your supper party. Yes, I suppose I knew definitely then, if I’m honest with myself. I spent the evening of the lecture wanting just to speak to you. And then at the garden party, I very nearly said something.” Then she freezes, momentarily. “ I nearly didn’t come here, you know.”

Jane looks amused and stays silent. Then, “Shall we sleep together?”

Linda draws back. “Jane, I’ve never done this. I wouldn’t know what to do. Maybe we need to think. I’m, well, not free. Are you? What about Terry, and Hector – and heaven knows who else?”

“There’s no one. No one I want, anyway. And as far as you not being free – I know what I’ll be letting myself in for. I have had a good while to think about things. Linda, I still want to be with you, even if there is Ken, as best we can.”

Linda hesitates before saying again, “I wouldn’t know what to do. Anyway, as you say, there’s Ken.”

Jane just smiles, looks at Linda, kisses her softly, and says, “I’ll be back shortly.”

Alone, Linda sits on her bed, facing the decision of her life. Susan’s pragmatic advice comes back to her.

When Jane returns back ten minutes later, Linda is as Jane left her, wine untouched. Jane brought pyjamas that Linda recognises from the hostel and a wrap-round. Linda comes to meet her at the door, her decision all but taken, but still anxious. Jane holds her, kisses her. At this moment, Linda is too frozen to respond. Then Jane releases her, goes round to the other side of the bed and, looking at her, takes off her denims and shirt. She stands for a second in bra and pants, a sight Linda has not thought of before now as arousing, and then slips in between the sheets to sit and wait for her. She turns the bed lights off and the room glows oranges from the street lamps.

Slowly, nervously, Linda does the same, and for a moment they lie on elbows, looking awkwardly at each other. Jane laughs gently and draws Linda to her to kiss her. Linda lets her take the lead as Jane kisses her again, then runs her fingers over Linda’s shoulders and arms and down to the cleavage between her breasts. She undoes Linda’s bra and looks at her breasts before running her lips over her nipples. Linda gasps slightly. Slowly, gently the caressing moves down over Linda’s hips, Linda clinging to Jane, afraid to touch her in turn as silently Jane kisses her. As she does so, she holds eye contact with Linda and then, easing away from her, gently pulls Linda’s pants off. Linda lets her and, excited now, reaches in turn for Jane’s bra and then her pants. They half lie, half sit, naked and looking at each other. A strange mix of contentment and vulnerability to the other woman comes over Linda. She feels shy as she smiles uncertainly at Jane. Jane’s body is wonderful, she thinks – round but not overweight and shining in the half-light. Linda is roused quickly as Jane gently puts her on to her back and gazes down at her, her silhouette outlined in the soft semi-light. As Jane kisses her, Linda’s tongue finds its way, urgently now, into Jane’s mouth. Now she is exploring Jane’s breasts and nipples with her hand, then her tongue. Jane leads again now as Linda’s breathing deepens and she runs her fingers over Linda’s thighs. Jane does not touch Linda where she now aches to be touched and she waits for Linda to follow her lead. Linda does. Excited and soon exploring the intimate areas of Jane’s body and emotions for the first time, Linda’s natural passion and desire for this woman lead to slow, overwhelming lovemaking and to different emotions from anything she has experienced before.

Jane shows her slowly what true lovemaking between women can be and takes her gently, through what she says and does, to closeness between them that Linda has never shared with anyone. Instinct taking over from Linda’s diffidence, the gentle teaching on Jane’s part gives way to true excitement and they come together, enveloped in passion and holding eye contact all the way.

Arms and legs wrapped round each other, they lie wet with exertion, looking at each other. Linda feels mildly drunk with emotion. An hour has passed since Jane came back from her own room.

Linda feels no guilt, no embarrassment and no regret. Holding Jane, kissing her and entwining their fingers, she feels only love for a woman who has shown her a part of herself she sensed was there. No one other than Jane would ever have been allowed to reveal this part of her. She tries to say something in gratitude but Jane just gently puts her fingers over Linda’s lips to hush her.

“Nonsense. I love you and you love me. It’s as simple as that.”

“But this makes me different.”

“Yes and no. They say it’s the potential in every woman.” Jane laughs quietly.

“I’m not sure Ken or Terry, or young Hector would agree with that.”

“Let’s leave them out of our bed,” Jane laughs, “And stay with the moment. All the tomorrows will come soon enough.”

“True.”

They doze, make love and talk the love talk of new lovers who have known each other for some time. Just after seven o’clock, Jane leaves reluctantly, to start the day from her own room. Virtually unslept, Linda prepares to meet a new day – shocked and energised all at once.

They meet over breakfast, tired but energised and those members of the team well enough to face food are still too jaded to notice the connection between them.

The whole party returns by mini-bus for a final clear up of the site where the barbecue happened. They walk together to the beach where Linda and Jane strolled over the fortnight. The two women find a moment in private, now seeing the sea through the eyes of lovers, and they promise to come back here in ten years time. In that moment, they make a new commitment; one of continuity.

In the evening, the team have a last dinner in the hotel. In the lounge bar, Hector makes a last attempt to win Jane whilst Linda sits several seats away, amused, and yet relieved when it is time to wind the evening up. She says goodnight to the group, a group in which everyone is emotional at the ending of a successful month’s work.

Linda showers and is in bed when the expected tap on the door comes, half an hour later.

The second night is as passionate and as intimate as the first, and more disinhibited for both. The depth of their emotions is only tinged by the fact that they will be separating to face their real lives on the following morning. Jane puts no pressure on Linda but does suggest her coming round to Jane’s flat on the day after her return to the city.

They agree to spend what time they can together in the months ahead, but otherwise to go on with life as before. Both know it will be hard. It is as if they have started on something that has already taken on significance and drive that are bigger than either of them can control.

On Sunday morning, Linda is to see the party off in their van and to spend what

she knows will be a miserable day until Monday’s flight. On impulse, after the prospect of being on the island without Jane, she dresses quickly when her lover leaves her, Jane now looking pale and drawn at their parting. Minutes later, she is in the foyer waiting for Jane with the rest of the party.

“Room for one more?”

Jane’s face does not conceal her delight. They will at least be able to be in each other’s company for the long ferry crossing and minibus trail across country, and back south to the city.

To gain hours like this is a bonus and it delays separation till late evening. They sit together up front in the minibus, Tom driving and Hector on the bench behind. Mostly, the two women talk to the men, each easy in the company of the other and with little need for conversation together. Only intimate talk and touch would satisfy their needs just now. On the crossing they all four have coffee together, Hector following Jane out on deck to watch the approaching mainland. Linda feels secure although her friend is out of sight, unsettled only at the slight tension in her friend’s face when she and Hector return. But Jane whispers “It was nothing” as they head back to the minibus – only that Hector asked her out to dinner when they get back this evening to the city. She declined, much to the young man’s irritation. Jane decides to sit by Hector on the rest of the drive to the city and Linda sees that this is by way of appeasement.

It is six when they cross the city bypass and they deposit some of the party along the way with sad yet boisterous farewells. They arrive on campus a half hour later. Here, they will relinquish the University bus and go their separate ways.

Linda and Jane stand, miserable now, as the men unload the bags.

“Come home with me,” Jane urges suddenly, out of earshot of the others.

Linda thinks quickly. She could ring Ken from her mobile. She is not due back until lunchtime tomorrow. And she and Jane only have four days left before Linda is due to fly out to Spain.

“Yes,” she murmurs.

To the barely concealed fury of Hector who, Linda realizes now, senses the exclusive friendship unfolding before his eyes, they agree to hail a taxi together. With a smile and a peck on the cheek for Hector from Jane, they make their goodbyes and set off to the campus gates to wait for a taxi.

Linda enters Jane’s flat and sits over a glass of wine with her until the food they send for by phone arrives. Before they eat, she rings Ken in Spain. She finds that lying to him about a dreary west coast island Sunday is easier than she anticipated. If there is a moment’s discomfort for her in this, it is short lived. Such is the nature of an urgent new relationship. They eat slowly, listen to music and talk quietly for an hour or so before going to bed for the third time. Now only each other matters as they enter once again the world of true lovemaking.

CHAPTER 16

She feels low despite the fact that the possible crisis of exposure is seemingly avoided. She reasons to herself that this is probably no more than the natural reaction of anti-climax and that weeks of tension and of protecting her interests have taken their toll.

Even the end of season party on the evening of the last TV programme did little to cheer her. She invited Bill but a professional dinner with some Queens Counsel or other meant that he could not be there. The prospect of several hours of the company of her work colleagues was somehow more than she could muster the energy for. But she was determined to make the best of it and duly turned up after a quick change at her flat into a smart little black dress with a low neckline and dropped back. Clothes create the mood, she thought, as she stepped out from her taxi, cheered by now and ready to entertain and be entertained.

There were about a hundred people there – all the team members, their partners and lovers, members of the Board dropping in for a courtesy drink, and some personalities who might be fodder for future programmes. It was an informal evening and there were no speeches, just drinks and quiet congratulations all round for the successful round of features that the series had covered. She mingled, very much the celebrity but conscious too that she was the front person for the people doing the real political and issue analysis that leads to each thirty minutes of footage. This was an evening for apparent modesty. So, much of the evening was about giving credit where it was elsewhere due. The Board’s Chief came over to her whilst she was with Jonathon Whitley and kissed her on the cheek. Susan was charming. This was the first time that she had seen Martin Braithwaite since the Ramsey letter was sent to the Company and she waited for him to make some reference to it. Instead, he chatted about the autumn series – she would be asked to discuss her next contract really soon. This was good news and she felt just a little relief as she and Jonathon exchanged glances. She was still valuable to the Company and if there had been any doubt ‘upstairs’ about her, the Chief was taking the opportunity tonight to say that they were all still in business together. There was a lightening to her mood after that and she allowed herself an extra glass of champagne beyond her usual two glasses. Too quickly, she was on a high but she was impervious to caution. Tonight was turning out better than she thought. The prospect of another series was quite exciting. After all, she had worked with this team for several years now and why move jobs and home and put distance between her and Bill if it could be avoided? And there were plenty of new ideas floating around this evening about how to bring new interest to the programme.

Mike Moss joined her somewhere late in the evening. A good-looking fellow, he might have been of interest to her in another place and at another time. But he is work and she makes a point of not mixing her personal encounters with people from the workplace. She has made that fact clear to him on several occasions now, although she often admits to herself that she likes his rather surly attention.

She also likes the way this pig-tailed man dresses – denims, always, and at the party, a dark blue open-necked shirt and blue leather belt. It would all be designer gear, she knew, and would have cost more than many of the suits in the room. He was so slim that she could see the outline of his hipbones. His hips narrowed beautifully and she could picture his naked rear view in her mind. She normally just works and talks shop with him, but as he stood by her, head and shoulders taller than she, she was very conscious of his piercing eyes and his intense expression as he looked at her.And he broke their usual business-like mode of relating, bringing her some more wine and later suggesting that they go to her office for a while to talk about the outdoor camera work needed for the next series. He was standing very close to her as he spoke and there was no misunderstanding his meaning. An encounter in the office was the clear invitation.

“In other circumstances, Mike, I would love to,” she said, making her interest but also her refusal, clear. “It would be a pleasure,” she hinted, “but, as I say, I don’t mix business and pleasure.”

Mike was angry at her refusal; she could see that. He turned to leave her there, and snapped that he thought that was precisely what she did – mix business and pleasure. The spectre of Mull and Ramsey reared momentarily in her head but she knew that Mike could only be guessing – he had been told nothing and he saw nothing on the island. And there was nothing else that he knew about her. She was momentarily discomforted as she stood there watching him put on a denim jacket and leave, glass abandoned, with one of the departmental secretaries in tow. But she rallied and gave it little more thought. She doubted that he would be the type to do any more than have his say. And, she had to admit to herself, a session with him would have been good. She felt herself roused at the invitation. She imagined that he would handle her well. There was a fantasy there, if nothing else, for later.

She was home by midnight; half hoping that Bill would be there. And he was, sitting in her lounge, malt whisky in his hand and, she saw at once, staring moodily at the fireplace. She did not like this new aspect to his character that she was seeing and just hoped that she could shake him out of it quickly.

She came to his side and he had the courtesy to get up to kiss her and to offer her a nightcap. She accepted, knowing that she would regret the mild headache that would now be inevitable the next morning. But she was still on a high and she wanted him to be there with her too.

She asked what was wrong, twirling his loose tie in her fingers as she did so and scrutinising his face from as close as she could get. This was meant to jolly him along rather than to be an invitation for serious talk. She saw him decide to open sexually to her rather than to talk and she allowed herself to be pulled on to his lap. He kissed her, hungrily, as if needing her to wipe something out from his mind. She responded, slipping her fingers down over his shirt buttons, letting him run his hands over her black dress and up from the hem.

They were in bed ten minutes later, in what became a rather feverish and fumbled session, their lovemaking dulled by the alcohol to the point where she began to lose interest. Mental images of Mike Moss helped her as the Mike in her head, in his blue shirt and denims, told her to undress in front of him whilst he sat. The mental image of obliging his various demands helped a lot. She was not sorry that Bill simply crashed out to sleep after he came and she was left in her private world of anonymous sex.

True to form, the headache is there but she wakes from a deep sleep and is remarkably refreshed as she comes to and gathers her thoughts. Her job is safe, she can hear Bill in the kitchen making coffee and she has not embarrassed herself at the party despite Mike’s invitation. And even better, she is now on holiday for the next few weeks. She can rest and play.

She will give her attention to Bill, she determines, as she lies there, stretching to the bedside drawer for a mild painkiller. She will see whether she can find out what was troubling him last night. If it is about them, she needs to know and if it is about something else, she might be able to help and, of course, make herself all the more necessary to him at the same time. She has to support him as much as he did her.

He comes into the bedroom, wearing only his boxer shorts, a dark skinned and well shaped, stocky man, who takes as much exercise in the squash courts and swimming pool as time permits. He manages golf as well but Susan suspects that the social aspects offset any real health benefits from that. He is evidently in cheerier mood but not yet the solicitous Bill that she likes him to be. She takes the coffee and as he sits on the bed, strokes his back and once again asks if something is troubling him.

“Just preoccupied, that’s all. Mainly with the evening meeting I had yesterday.”

“Tell me,” she invites him, not sure yet whether to believe him.

She knows already that Bill’s dinner last evening with a Queen’s Counsel was an expense account business meeting. This QC is preparing a brief on behalf of Bill’s firm for a forthcoming defence of one of their clients. Now Bill tells her how the evening panned out. When the business and dinner were over and they were drinking coffee, Jeremy Parkhurst, Q. C., started to discuss the firm that Bill and Alistair have built up and new proposals currently under discussion within the legal profession for the creation of solicitor-advocates within the justice system.

Bill explains, as she runs her fingers down his back to the base of his spine. The move to allow solicitors to act in court has, until now, been opposed by Q.C.s; for they hold a bastion of control, income and prestige within the judicial system. But it is now receiving growing support from inside and outside the profession as a means of lessening client costs and of speeding court procedures. The news from last night, which came as a surprise to Bill, is that Parkhurst is encouraging Bill and Alistair to go down this route of acting in court at the earliest opportunity. They are being asked to pioneer the new role for solicitors in court. The encouragement comes, Bill tells her, from the respect in which both partners are apparently held, both in their own sphere and in the city’s political and financial world. If this hybrid role is coming, Parkhurst argued, it is in everyone’s interests that only the best practitioners are admitted.

“But that’s wonderful,” she reflects, seeing that this will be an enormous career boost for Bill. Why, she wonders, is he being so cautious and almost unenthusiastic? He is, after all, at the peak of what can be achieved within the firm. “Surely”, she starts to say, “This has to be good news?”

What he says next floors her. She is not prepared for the plain talking that follows. “I have a dilemma, Susan and I can’t clear it from my mind. Put simply, I can’t

afford any hint of scandal in my private life if my career is to progress along the lines held out by Parkhurst. Conversely, my Dear, I am not about not to relinquish you on the basis of a false allegation.”

She has no sense yet of what direction Bill is taking with this statement. Is he finishing it between them? Or is he making some sort of loyalty assertion?

“Apart from my emotional attachment to you, you would be a wonderful wife and, to be frank, an eminently suitable partner in the context of my career.”

She listens, stunned at the way he is describing their relationship from the perspective of his own legal and social interests. He might be right, but this makes uncomfortable listening. She struggles to keep her cool and not to feel outraged. It feels as if she is being falsely accused, as if the description of her is, somehow, diminishing. And she has no intention of being used as an accessory to anyone.

Bill senses what she is feeling and stretches over to put an arm around her before continuing.

“If there is any one person I can entrust with the dilemma, at least in part, it’s

Alistair Berry. In any event, my career future and Alistair’s are inextricably linked. I have a duty,” he argues to Susan, “To take Alistair into my confidence and to seek his

advice in the interests of the firm. I think I should outline the dinner meeting with Parkhurst and the proposal that we should both consider becoming solicitor-advocates. I’ll make it clear that I believe the proposal is sound. The other part is to tell Alistair about you, Susan. About you and Ramsey’s allegations, I mean.” He pauses, protesting now. “You know that I would like to marry you. The thing is, though, that the firm cannot afford any hint of anything – what shall I say – awry.”

Susan tries to look puzzled now.

“There have been these allegations against you, whether we like it or not. They obviously don’t look as though they will go any further. And they are quite spurious. Please don’t misunderstand me, Susan. I know that they are spurious. But if they were to come out – well, it could be difficult all round. You know yourself that if allegations hit the public domain, they tend to be believed by the public.”

Susan sits still against her pillows, not looking at Bill, listening to his words, convinced now that this is a none-too-subtle way of saying goodbye.

“Susan, I think we should engage a private investigator to see what this man Ramsey is up to.”

This silences Susan, this strange, somehow dubious-seeming and, certainly as far as she is concerned, dangerous idea. Bill seems to read her thoughts and presses on.

“It’s not necessarily the unethical, tacky business you think. Let’s face it, law firms, and the corporate sector, as well as the public, use detectives this way. Even government circles, the police – who knows who else – use investigation if they need to for all sorts of bona fide, and not so bona fide, reasons.”

She knows Bill is serious – she simply had not foreseen anything like this over Ramsey – certainly not in the so-called interests of the firm. But she sees immediately that Bill now has a clear agenda – the firm’s protection. At least, this is how it is being wrapped up. Is he really stitching her up to agree to being investigated? She can see for herself the irrefutable logic of what he is saying. It is genuine, or it is clever, or it is both.

“What do you think? You would have every right to be furious.”

“Not if you believe that the allegations are lies, Bill.” She plays for time and tries to think herself into a reality where she is the innocent in all this. “At the end of the day, you have your own interests to protect. But why do this? What can an investigator find out that we don’t already know?”

“Well, if nothing else, he might be able to find out what Ramsey is intending to do next,. He might find out whether he is up to anything else. And that we do not know.”

“Where would we find someone suitable? I mean, where would you find someone?”

“I could find someone reputable. We have plenty of contacts with legal firms who use investigators, for all sorts of reasons – missing people, evidence collection. You know the sorts of things.”

Susan sits silent for a moment before commenting.

“You must do what you think right, Bill. But if there is no immediate hurry, why don’t you wait a while? I’m all but certain that it has blown over already. And last night, I had the next series confirmed by Martin Braithwaite. So there can’t be any concerns about my reputation, as far as the TV Company are concerned. Having a private detective could just be a waste of money. I gather that these services don’t come cheap?”

“No. But the firm can stand the expense.”

She does not like this one little bit. It is as if the threat has somehow come right into her bedroom and that her protector in all this is about to make himself the agent of an investigation that could expose her. She cannot protest too much, though. That would be counter-productive. Tempted as she is to express outrage and to throw something at Bill, she knows this is not the way through this problem.

“Why act immediately? Why not check with Alistair whether he thinks an investigator is a good idea? He’s on holiday just now? Would it not be better to wait till he’s back?” She shifts her position in the bed and reaches for his waistband. “ Anyway, my dear Bill, I have another suggestion for your energies for the next few days.”

He looks down at her, obviously expecting her to initiate lovemaking but instead, she reaches beyond him for a phone directory.

“Is there any reason why you must be in the city for the next few days?”

He thinks for a second before shaking his head. The business is quiet with the start of the holiday season and he has a light workload. There will not be any further movement on the solicitor-advocate system until the autumn. Alistair is away but there is someone reliable in the staff group who is not due to take leave until the autumn.

She suggests Rome. His eyes widen slightly in surprise. Thankfully, he looks positive. Perhaps, if she can distract him with a long weekend break, perhaps the idea of having private detectives running around will look less sensible on his return. She reasons with him in terms of sleeping on it. As she uses the words, she draws him down on top of her.

Later that morning, she showers and listens through the open door as Bill books scheduled flights for the evening and rings through to a five star hotel somewhere near the Vatican. Neither of them has been in Rome and they intend to holiday in style. Bill enthuses now about staying on in Italy and seeing something of Tuscany, but she is not committing herself that far ahead. It will all depend on the arrangements for the signing of the TV contract. Until that is signed, she is not free to just abandon the city.

Bill leaves her so that they can both pack. She has a few hours to herself in which to sort her thinking out about this latest threat. But leaving the country has had the effect on her, as well, she suspects, as on Bill, of making the whole Ramsey business seem remote.

She rings Linda. She knows that her friend is due to go off to Spain to join Ken any day now. Surprisingly, Linda has not been in touch since going to the dig. Normally, she would have been in touch to say how the work has gone and to check how Susan is.

Linda answers the phone cautiously. She has had a great time on the island. She listens while Susan brings her up to date on the proposal to engage a private detective and sees the danger for Susan right away. Her advice is to distract Bill from the idea as quickly as possible. She thinks that the Rome trip might just do that. It sends a frisson down Susan’s back when Linda suggests that Susan might end up with a straight choice. She is under threat in two ways; one from press exposure that could damage her career; one from the investigator finding out about her and Ramsey. If it comes to a choice, Linda points out, she needs to know which it will be – Bill or her career.

Susan has not thought it through to this point but she knows that Linda, clear headed as ever, is right. All she says to Linda is that she will face that problem as and when it arises. She feels a kind of defensive aggression almost, as, over the phone, she asks Linda in turn whether she has made her own choices. If Linda hears the tone change, she says nothing. She just says that, yes, she has made her choices. Susan regrets her way of asking right away and asks, encouragingly, “And?”

“And, I am very, very happy, Susan.”

In that moment, Susan knows just how happy Linda is. And she envies her.

“Good. I really am pleased for you, you know. Come on then, Linda, who is she?”

There is a moment’s silence before Linda’s replies.

“Jane Gray.”

Of course. The vivacious American woman. Susan will never understand one woman choosing another in any sexual sense of understanding but she can see the attraction of the personality.

She makes Linda promise that she can meet up with Jane as soon as Linda gets back from Spain. She also wants to know how it all happened. But she is worried to hear that Linda is now delaying her trip out to Spain in order to spend a day or two extra with Jane. She thinks that is dangerous – understandable, but dangerous. She augurs caution; Linda must not let Ken become suspicious. The woman is not her usual rational self, though. Susan can hear that down the phone. Mind you, if she were being rational, she would not be having a relationship with anyone from the workplace in the first place, let alone with another woman.

But now is not the time. Linda is obviously experiencing all that illness and madness that they had talked about in the vegetarian bistro that evening in the spring. All that Susan can do is just envy her for the thing she is experiencing and encourage her to be careful. Linda just laughs, which tells Susan how far she has shifted in the course of just a couple of weeks.

Half amused, half concerned, Susan finishes off her packing in time to hear the doorbell announce the arrival of Bill and the airport taxi. In the taxi he presents her with a gift box and in it a gold brooch. It is a token of love and trust, he says, kissing her under the amused eye of the driver who watches them through the rear mirror. Now he lands his news on her. He has used the hours to get in touch with someone called Paul Shand. There seemed little point in waiting, he decided, after their conversation. Shand, an investigator, she realizes, will be able to get on with the job whilst they are in Rome.

“I’m sure this person – Paul Shand – will be good. And he will be confidential. Apparently, he has a growing reputation in the city as someone who can be absolutely discreet. If this weren’t the case, I would have suggested a national firm from London. But local knowledge might serve us better here.”

She listens. Her impulse is to throw the brooch at him in fury. But for the fact that they are being observed, she might do just that. But she whispers at him in tones that leave him in no doubt about her feelings. How dare he go ahead after that conversation? He starts to reassure her, but she is indifferent to his argument. He goes on explaining. Susan sulks but she listens.

Bill went to see Paul Shand by appointment. He was pleasantly surprised to see that Shand’s offices were smart – not dissimilar to his own in the firm’s earlier days. Shand, to Bill’s further surprise, proved to be a smartly dressed, tall young man, not far from Bill’s own age. He is, apparently, personable, friendly and polite. He explained that he has been in this line of business now for four years since a back injury at work had left him with limited career opportunities in the police force. Faced with a desk job or going it alone, he chose the latter. He wants all new prospective clients to know that he is concerned to be a reputable business. He has a Charter, which he holds to and which commits him to meeting the intelligence needs of his clients, within the law, and in the shortest time possible. To do so, he said, he uses the latest technology as well as more established forms of investigation. Needless to say, Bill comments, confidentiality is guaranteed, as is routine, regular updating on progress.

Bill tells her that he showed Shand the anonymous letter. This stops Susan in her tracks as they made their way to the check-in.

“You tore that letter up, Bill.”

Bill has the good grace to look apologetic. He ran off a copy on the morning before he left the office to show the original to her. Susan turns from him in disgust.

“Paul Shand thinks that he’ll be able to get to Ramsey and find out what he is up to,” Bill argues as he passes over his passport to the check in.

But she is barely listening. She walks off to the ladies room to cool off and to decide whether she is getting on that plane. Ten minutes later, when she emerges from the toilet, she is once again composed and comments only that she wishes that he had been more open with her. He is full of apology, saying that he did it for the best, for the firm and for her protection. They are strained, but they make it to the flight. And as champagne kicks in, Susan allows herself to be wooed back to being the offended but forgiving partner who really does know that something has been done for the best.

She is cooler though. Hard as she tries, she cannot slot into the holiday mood that she was intending for these few days. By the first evening, as they eat in a fashionable restaurant very close to St Peter’s Square, her thoughts return again and again to what this man Shand will be doing with his researches into Ramsey and what, if anything, he might dig up about those days on Mull. He has two sources of information. One is Ramsey himself. The other is Mike Moss. Would Shand think to find out who else was on the island with her? If he does, it could give some credence to Ramsey’s account. Perhaps she should have been more attentive to Mike at the party? Or would that just have alienated him further at the end of the day? She wishes she were not in Rome. She wishes she could talk it through with Linda. She feels totally powerless, maybe for the first time in her life. She is the one who usually takes action. She does not at all like this sitting, having to be passive and waiting to see what, if anything, will come of Bill’s engaging Shand. As she looks at Bill, she feels none of the lustful passion of the night before. A heavy day’s travelling and a weary headache from the champagne is an excuse for a sexless night of sleep. A good night’s rest, she persuades him, will make their exploration of the city the next morning all the more enjoyable.

Rome turns out to be unbearably hot, big and noisy. But she makes as best she can of the next three days. After all, they have neither of them visited the city before and it holds a wealth of interest – mediaeval, ancient, and religious. Bill courts her and she falls back into pleasing him and into the intimacy of their private time. They eat well, live luxuriously and see as much of the city as a private taxi can cover in the time. But the memory of Linda’s observations ring in her mind. She is under no illusion – if it comes to a choice between Bill and career, it will be her career. With Bill and no career, she would be nothing. With career and no Bill, she would be unassailably Susan. She would be sad for a while, but she would recover. For now though, if she can have both, that is what she wants. And it is her safest option.

Her opportunity to get back, leaving Bill in Italy, comes when she has a phone call from Jonathon Whitley’s secretary. Could she be back by Friday to sign the contract? She agrees at once and comes off the phone to persuade Bill to continue with the trip that he has been talking about over the days – up the coast to Tuscany and across to Elba. There is no point in both of them returning to the city, especially as Bill cleared his desk for the fortnight. If Elba is all that he has been led to believe, it might make a lovely place to honeymoon. This persuades him. She will have one more day with him and fly back on her own.

She will be free, she thinks privately, to decide what, if anything, to do about Mike Moss. And she might even go to see this man Shand.

CHAPTER 17

Linda and Jane had just three more nights in the city before Linda was due to re-enter her family life. It was stolen time. Linda called Ken to say that there were a couple of urgent things at the University that she required to do. Other than sorting her clothes at home ready for the trip to Spain, she spent all the time in Jane’s apartment. She left Jane’s flat this morning towards noon. The couple spent the morning together, pensive and silent as the time moved towards the moment of separating.

They showered together and whilst Jane went out for croissants, Linda dressed. She found two mugs, made a cafetiere and took a tray out onto the

small balcony. Jane joined her, dressed, Linda noticed, in the same denims and shirt, laundered again, that she had worn just days ago in the Hebrides. Linda smiled sadly and said how nice she looked.

‘Thank you,’ was all Jane managed in reply as she sat down and accepted the

proffered coffee. Neither could really face the croissants. Jane looked at her friend and said,

“Do you think we can see each other as soon as you get back from Spain?”

“I think so. I have to meet Susan for supper in town. She’ll be back from Rome by then. I could come round afterwards, even if I only stay an hour.” As Linda said this, she felt the beginning of the double life that she was embarking on crowd into their conscious minds.

“Better than nothing,” Jane laughed wearily.

“On second thoughts, why not come to supper with us? You met her briefly at the

party and she liked you. Besides, I have already told her about you and my feelings for you. We might as well meet her and soon. She’s a sympathetic friend. Actually,

I’m dying to have an evening with you two together.”

Jane thought about this before saying anything.

“Don’t you think we have to keep this quiet, in terms of the University and Ken? And will Susan not be against it, because you are married?”

“I agree we have to be careful. But I do trust Susan. I’ve known her since my London days and I told her about us the other evening before she went off to Rome. She wasn’t fazed at all. And she certainly won’t make moral judgments. Life is too short in Susan’s book for that.”

“Well, you must be the best judge. I certainly liked her - she was straightforward. And I would sure be proud to be with you.”

Jane leant over and put her mug down.

“I do love you, Linda. It’s going to be hard. Much harder than I thought.”

“I know,” Linda replied. “For me too. I don’t want to go out to Spain. Actually,

I’d like never to leave you again.”

Jane looked at her, as if trying to work out whether this was lover’s free talk or genuinely meant sentiment.

“You can’t mean that. You love Ken and the children. It’s different for me. I’m an unattached woman – free in every sense, emotionally.”

“And how do you feel about me now, after these days?’

“You are everything I want in a life partner.” Jane said this quietly and sadly, knowing the future as she did.

Linda believed her. For all that she now knew about Jane’s previous two women friends and her choice of women over her boyfriends, she still knew that this was as significant a relationship for Jane as it was for her.

“Jane, Darling. I don’t want to rush you but would you come to Spain?”

Jane’s face showed her surprise.

“How on earth could I do that?”

“Well, I could say that you were coming out anyway to look at church

architecture, maybe in Santiago de Compostela or somewhere else along the Pilgrims’ Route. It’s reasonably near to Ken’s parents’ home and just the sort of place you would like. I’ll say that I have invited you to join us for a day or two. It’s a big house and Ken’s parents are very welcoming so they will be fine. The kids are out and about with their friends over there so we might get a bit of time to ourselves.”

Jane looked at her friend, pain in her next question reflecting her realisation of what the future would hold.

“But not sleep together?” The question was more rhetorical than real and Jane looked at Linda, and then lowered her eves.

“Difficult. I’m sorry – that was completely insensitive.” Linda knew that she was being selfish and unreasonable to ask this trip of Jane.

Jane sat silent, her choices being either to refuse the invitation or to accept knowing what her nights would be like.

“I’d like to come. That bit won’t be easy but it won’t be any easier being here. I can hardly bear to think of you in Ken’s bed.”

The decision taken, Linda finally leaves to return to her own home to pack and to see to checking that the house is closed down. But her day is empty. She drifts around the place, looking at it through new eyes. She is restless and disturbed. Part of her feels elation at the intensity of their new relationship. The sensations, scents, and memories of Jane hover around her; in her clothes, and in her suitcase as she repacks it. She finds Jane’s impromptu gift to her of rounded stones and shells from the beach on which they walked. She places them in a ceramic bowl by her bedside.

Spain will be wonderful. But she is already facing the prospect of a life of waiting – for the next call or meeting or time together. She had little emotional choice, from the moment Jane stepped from into the airport terminal on the Hebridean Isles, but to go into the relationship. She knows now that it will cost her dear.

She misses the children – nothing can ever change that. But returning to Ken is going to be hard. There is an emotional distance there now for her and probably an intuition in Ken that will cause difficulty. She knows that all these years of marriage are about to be put to the test. And they will put her to the test.

She has already decided that her marriage has to continue for the sake of the children and for her sake in relation to the children. Jane and she have been clear about this from the start and Jane will not put any pressure on her.

She calls Jane. Two hours without contact is too difficult and she finds being back in the house strange, as if she cannot connect to it. She thinks she would like to be in some sort of emotional decompression chamber till she can cope again.

Jane listens without comment as Linda recounts how she rang Ken and he seemed remote but asked detailed questions about the dig and the fortnight.

Ken has already changed from husband to being someone to be discussed between

them. If Linda feels any discomfort at this, it is overshadowed by her quiet satisfaction at the place she already holds in Jane’s affections.

At bedtime Linda lies in the twilight of Jane’s flat, reflecting on how she now feels

about this woman in her arms. She would give anything to be able to live with her and to make a life with her. And she is convinced in her own mind that this is not just the sentiment of someone wanting the unattainable. She can even cope with waiting until the children leave home.

Perhaps she is daydreaming to think that she and Jane could ever be together. Why should Jane wait that long? But Jane does love her, she knows that, and she has made a commitment to at least being on the edge of Linda’s time.

Linda’s life is one of high standing in the community – in terms of family and career. She has now taken a step that brings a secret into her otherwise ordered life. It will be a hard lifestyle to live but one from which she already knows she will not walk away. Neither, she concludes, will Jane. They have a connection that neither of them has experienced before. That is the strength of their relationship.

She spends the following day seeing friends for coffee whilst Jane buys a few clothes for Spain, arguing cheerfully that she cannot really afford them, as this will be an unbudgeted holiday. But, she rationalises, she wants to look good for Linda. The clothes from Turkey will not do.

The next evening they go round to Jane’s friends, Nicola and Jacky, for supper at their home. The lesbian couple are not in the least surprised to be told that Linda and Jane are lovers. It was somehow obvious – Linda cannot imagine how – on the night of the supper party that it was inevitable. They are as welcoming as ever. And Linda finds enormous pleasure in having her new relationship celebrated by two well-balanced, serious and warm women friends – friends with whom she is already safe.

Linda experiences a pang of envy at the other women’s lives together, doctor and teacher with the joint income and independence to lead an almost privileged life. No one else is involved or affected, and they are obviously still very much in love with each other. But it is envy, and not jealousy, and she is glad for them. She talks at length about her summer on the island with Jane and about how they came together. She mentions Jane’s name more than she needs to but hesitates to share any intimate information with the two women. For all that, she knows that she is in a new form of community and one that she will need in the time ahead. These are the people with whom they make their first statement of their newfound feelings for each other. No matter how their lives will be shared from here, they are becoming a couple.

She wonders, and feels safe enough to ask, how Nicola and Jacky feel about the circumstances surrounding her relationship with Jane. By this she means the fact that she is married with children and that she is Jane’s boss.

They have only sympathy for the hard road that they know Linda and Jane will have to travel. They make no judgment other than to say that the way in which women find themselves in terms of their identity in mid adulthood is part of patriarchal life. In their experience, these situations are not uncommon. And although they have no children themselves, they both know how important they are to any mother.

The evening ends with a suggestion from Jane’s friends that they join them and some other women, whom they think Linda will like, for supper at the end of September. She accepts and pictures in her mind’s eye, as they make the taxi journey home, Jane at her side as her partner in the company of like-minded people. She likes the idea. She is entering a double life. Just now, it all seems possible.

She picks up a message via her remote from her answer phone at the house. She is monitoring it so that Ken will not be aware that she is at Jane’s flat. But this message is from Susan. She is back from Rome and would like to see Linda before she goes out to Spain. Is that going to be possible?

They have one evening left before they fly out together via London to Santiago. Linda thinks quickly. She really just wants Jane to herself. And, frankly, she is getting just a bit weary of Susan’s current pickle. She has a limit to how long her listening ear will be sympathetic. But what nicer thing to do so than introduce Jane to Susan properly? She returns the call as soon as Jane agrees and they suggest one of the fish restaurants near Jane’s flat. Susan is out but Linda leaves a message.

Coming together at night into each other’s arms now has a familiarity about it. Lovemaking is as gently passionate as it was at the island hotel and lasts for hours at a time. The mornings are theirs and so they are now into a rhythm and pattern of being together that is still new but already has its own little rituals of intimacy, laughter and looking after each other. Linda knows there is already no going back from this relationship, even if she wanted to.

She rings Ken in the late morning. He is offhand and niggled about details of what Linda is doing, why she delayed going out to Spain and why she wanted to see Santiago with Jane rather than get to him and the children. The fact that it is a place of fascination for historians and archaeologists somehow sounds hollow, even to her.

“Well. I suppose I did lie to him,” she acknowledges to Jane later. “I don’t do that. But I honestly can’t feel guilty. He seemed to be trying to catch me out rather than to be enquiring how I’ve got on. That rather put my back up. But I contained my irritation. By the end of the call he was a bit better and it felt easier again.”

She sees Jane brace herself for the next question.

“How did you feel about him?”

Linda looks at her and raises her eyebrows in a way that indicates some guilt.

“Jane, you can’t live with someone for all these years and share your children with him without loving him dearly. And I do. But what I feel for you is different. It’s passion, of a kind I’ve never felt before. It’s a connection – I don’t know – words are so inadequate, aren’t they? It’s a total feeling. I’m as much in like with you as I am in love with you.”

Jane laughs and takes Linda into her arms. She does not want to hear any intimate details of Linda’s forthcoming return to Ken and neither of them refers to it again. The clock is ticking against them and they have to leave to meet Susan. In the lift down from the flat Jane comments,

“It doesn’t sound as though Spain is such a good idea.”

“I’ve dealt with Spain. You’re coming and – wait for it – I’m staying in Santiago with you for two nights.”

Kate laughs with delight.

What did Ken say, for God’s sake?”

“I just told him what I thought I’d do and he was silent for a bit. He muttered something about our family holiday being interrupted but he didn’t disagree. I’ve e-mailed his parents and they are happy for you to visit.”

“I think it might be better if I just see Santiago on my own and then come over to join you.” reflects Jane.

“No, no. I want to spend as much time with you as I can. I also hope we can spend some time with the children. I think they will like you.”

It is left there. The harbour side is busy with tourists and city dwellers out enjoying the warm summer evening. It all brings a vaguely Continental feeling to the area around Jane’s flat. It would be natural to stroll hand in hand anywhere other than in the city where they both work. But they do not, instead linking arms and smiling in silent recognition at the two women whom they do see who are holding hands.

“Good for them,” Jane laughs.

As they enter the restaurant, they see that Susan has already arrived and is half way down a glass of red wine. Jane watches Susan’s face as they walk towards her. She seems open and warm. She greets Jane first with a kiss to the cheek and says she is delighted that Jane could join them. She hugs Linda, and Linda thinks she hears Susan chuckle.

“You two look healthy - all the Hebridean sun, I take it?”

As soon as the conversation turns to Spain and Linda’s imminent departure, Linda

informs Susan that Jane has agreed to go out to Santiago with her so that they can spend some more time together. She looks at Susan with a twinkle of the eye and waits for her reply.

“So I take it congratulations are in order?” is how Susan phrases it.

Jane laughs as Linda replies.

“Very much so.”

Susan laughs too, raises her glass and toasts them,

“I wish you both so much happiness.”

Linda glows with the moment of acceptance. So they talk and share their relationship and its creation in the Hebrides with another trusted friend. But this time is different from when they met the two women. There is a hesitation; a kind of implicit double-checking that it really is all right with Susan.

But it is a good evening, further cementing Jane and Linda by Susan’s endorsement. If Susan has any note of caution, it is only based on pragmatism – that taking Jane to Ken’s parents is sailing very close to the wind. Linda simply retorts that they can handle things.

The restaurant is alive with people – every table taken and the waiters working at full, cheery speed to keep the guests fed. It is easy for Linda to occasionally touch Jane’s hand or cheek. Everyone seems oblivious.

Over the last glass of wine from the litre carafe, Linda finally asks Susan what progress there is on ‘the other matter’. Susan replies obliquely that there could be further problems. The chap concerned might be home now or sometime soon, she understands. It is all a matter of what he does or what the other person fishing about finds out. She has heard and done nothing since getting back to the city. Something else happened to take her attention off that business for a while.

“Uh huh.” Is Linda’s only response. And then, as if to change the subject, she says,

“How’s Bill, by the way?”

Linda detects a flicker of what she thinks is irritation in Susan’s face. Her reply is

non-committal. Jane clearly decides on a tactical visit to the toilet, leaving the two to talk about Susan’s private business, and spends far too long washing her hands. She even manages a few seconds’ chat with the headwaiter before returning to the table. Bless her, Linda thinks. It gives Susan and her a bit of time to hear Susan’s news. There is little more about Ramsey. But Linda can hardly credit what she listens to in the next few minutes.

After she left Bill, Susan met some Italian man at Rome airport and the flight was delayed. He bought her drinks and then sat with her on the flight. Linda fears that she knows what is coming next. And she is right. Susan had dinner and, Linda gathers, much more besides with the man. No wonder Susan has problems with her life. Linda nearly loses patience but realizes that this is not the time. For now, Linda is the only person in whom Susan can confide.

She acted on impulse and with drink taken. She regretted it afterwards. The man’s name was Alberto, Susan says, and for once she quite liked the man. This just brings a raised eyebrow from Linda and, seeing it, a laugh from Susan. Between them, they suddenly see the humour of the flight home and of Susan’s indiscretions and both are in tears of helpless laughter when Jane rejoins them.

“Susan is just back from Rome,” Linda explains, drying her eyes and making a valiant attempt to bring Jane back into the conversation and to give them all something to focus on. “She’s been telling me her adventures.”

Jane has the sense to ask no questions. But Susan proves ready to open up in front of Jane and to talk very generally about her time with Bill, basically saying the relationship was nice but not what she hoped it might be. She does not refer to Alberto. She looks thoroughly wistful as she says,

“Watching you two tonight, I know what I’m missing. Not,” she adds hastily, “that a woman would be my cup of tea, you understand.”

This causes another ripple of laughter around the table.

The conversation shifts to debating whether the same intensity of women’s

relationships is to be found between men and women. Jane and Susan think not, but for different reasons. Jane thinks that nothing could equal her experience of being within a woman-to-woman relationship. Susan is quite lost as to how it could satisfy – by which she meant sexually. Linda thinks the intensity could be the same, though she does admit that her love for Ken has always been of a different order, somehow, to her feelings for Jane.

It is a good, warm evening and they part with warm kisses from Susan to each of them. They are now a trio of friends, a trio which each feels will continue from a solid foundation. Well, Linda thinks, it is as solid as the divide between Susan’s sexuality and theirs will allow.

None of them pays any attention to the neighbouring tables or to the people sitting at them.

Before flying out to Spain, Linda listens as Jane rings her brother. His delight for her that she has found her partnership is evident and, having met Linda, he is able to say that he likes her very much. He too knows what Jane is letting herself in for in terms of being involved with a married woman. He does not mince his words in saying so but brother and sister both know that Jane is beyond the point of dissuasion. He does advise her, though, not to tell their parents, protecting his sister from twofold disappointment – their reactions to the gender of their daughter’s final choice of partner and the moral issues entailed in Linda’s married status. Jane has no difficulty in accepting this advice. After the call, which she has sat silently through, Linda points out that he was talking a great deal of sense.

They land at Santiago – a small rural airport – to a different world of temperatures in the high seventies. The place is full of an unusual array of foreign travellers, mainly backpackers of all ages. Outside the terminal, travellers arriving at the airport after the completion of their pilgrimages sport walking crooks adorned with shells. These are walkers and modern-day pilgrims who have traversed the pilgrimage route across the north of Spain to where the remains of Saint James now lie in the cathedral – or so religious tradition has it.

Their hotel is stylish, sitting on the edge of an enormous square in Santiago. It is almost a museum in its own right with its mediaeval cloisters and array of antique oak furniture. From the doors of the hotel it is a one minute walk to the ornate and gold embellished Cathedral, one of the most impressive that either women has ever seen. Even to non-religious people such as themselves, it is still an overwhelming experience to join the queue of pilgrims, all here to see the remains of Saint James.

The days and nights in Santiago are as Linda imagined they could be, both

women increasingly convinced that they are in a long term and committed relationship. Linda tells Jane again, though, that she cannot and will not contemplate leaving Ken until the children are independent. Jane sees at once the logic of what Linda says. It is only a matter of five or six years, time in which they can spend as much time together as possible. At one level, it will be an eternity; at another, it is time that they can use to build their foundations for later. In the safety of their togetherness, here in Santiago, it is almost easy to contemplate. But she knows that what she basically wants is to be with Jane on a day-to-day basis.

Sensible and adult as she tries to be, Jane says that it is hard to accept that Linda’s mothering instinct will come above everything else. But relief lies in the fact that Linda is putting her long-term future in Jane’s orbit and not in Ken’s. Jane finds that she has no compunction in the thought of being a party to the end of a marriage.

In the quiet of their nights in Santiago, and away from the immediate pressures of their first days and nights together, they have some time to talk in the small hours and to learn more about the different pasts that brought them to this point. There is less for Linda to tell Jane. She had attractions and always knew of her feelings just as she described them to Susan, but her life with Ken was as inwardly conventional as outwardly apparent. Linda’s only regret is that she had never told her mother about her feelings for women, and of course, when her mother was killed in the Canadian car crash, the chance was gone for good. She lies in Jane’s arms, grieving for her mother and for lost opportunity and crying for the first time in her life for the distance that she created between herself and her parents. Jane holds her, nursing her silently in the dark until the tears ease. Linda’s brother Danny knows nothing. Perhaps she should tell him, one day.

Later, she asks Jane what her parents know. Jane talks quietly, her lilting accent carrying the pain of so many years of struggle before she arrived at this point.

“Basically, I came to the University for all the professional reasons you know but also because, I guess, I was running away. I grew up in small town America near the Colorado Mountains. I went to High School there and had one or two boyfriends. And. Yes, I slept with them. But I adored my best friend Jennifer and, well, just wanted to be with her all the time. We went to dances together with the guys and petted with them in their cars – you know the way it is. Anyway, Jennifer got serious over this guy Gary and they got married when I was twenty-one. I was sort of gutted, you know, but even at that age I didn’t really know why. That seems crazy now. Well, after that, I went on, finished college and graduated in American literature. I met a man called Ricky when I started teaching and we dated for years. He wanted to get married and I kept putting it off. We were eventually sharing a flat and it was OK, I guess, but I met a woman – she was a teacher too – when I was thirty. It was like Jennifer all over again except I knew now what it was that I was feeling. We had an affair. I couldn’t say it was more than that. But then Ricky found out and told my parents in a bid to keep me. God, it was like World War Three in the family for a while. Ricky put pressure on me to leave Carole and I stuck it out for a while but I couldn’t fight all of them plus the culture. My family are pretty devout churchgoers, so you can imagine what it was like.”

She reaches out for Linda and squeezes her hand before continuing.

“So, basically, I eventually just upped and left. I went to New York, studied archaeology. And the rest you know. I taught for a while over there, came and made a new life here.”

“What about your personal life now, since you came here?” Linda is hoping to hear that there has been no one else.

“Well, you could call me a nun, a veritable nun, till I met you.” Jane laughs.

Linda feels the relief of knowing that there has been no one else in the time they have known each other.

“Terry, over in Business Studies, is a nice guy and we have a lot of fun. And for a while I thought about him, just to marry him and have children for my parents’ sake. But that would have been crazy. I know now what truly being in love is.”

Jane goes on in more neutral vein.

“Your culture over here is a funny mix. You are free, within boundaries, to be yourself but unless you want to go to pretty low dives in this city, to be honest, it’s more a question of networking – like we do at the flat and with people like Jacky and Nicola.

Otherwise, I don’t say anything. People make all sorts of assumptions. At the moment I’m seen as straight. People make that assumption because I’m outgoing, pretty and fun at a party. So, by definition, I must be straight. I suppose I don’t want to rock the boat of people’s perceptions. If there’s any question of being gay, they redefine you right away. And there’s no going back. I tried being out in New York and got pigeonholed. I suppose I was stereotyped. No – now I just say nothing and let people make their own assumptions.”

Linda cannot argue. But Jane, thank God, did not follow the conventional route that she herself took. If she had, she would, no doubt, have been the all-American wife and church-going working mother, who visited the parents and parents-in-law regularly, celebrated Thanksgiving with the family every year and drove into the mountains to the family condo every summer. She says as much to Jane who confirms that she would never have met Linda if she had not broken free of the expectations on her. And, she says, it is not as if she minds sex with men. She doesn’t. It is more that she never felt the intimacy and closeness with a man that she feels with a woman. But she also knows that the very existence of these feelings prohibit her from making any permanent commitment to any of the men she met. Now there is Linda and this is what she has been waiting for.

So they talk, listen and make long-term plans, living as well for the moment in Santiago. They enjoy the town, the awesome cathedral with its pilgrims’ mass and the baroque architecture. Mostly they enjoy each other. They wander the streets in the day, eat in the hotel in the evenings and make love by night. They buy and exchange different, but similar gold rings.

The drive to Llanes is long and quiet as each prepares for the days ahead. The grandeur of the mountain scenery is not lost on them, though, and Linda drives with care and competence, pointing out landmarks to Jane as they go.

The home of Ken’s parents is large and ornate in Spanish style. This is an area of rural life contrasting with retirement and holiday homes of well heeled Spaniards. Returning to their roots after years in their British restaurant trade allowed Ken’s parents to settle to a comfortable existence in the land of their youth.

They welcome Jane to their home in both expansive and simple mode. They hope that she will feel at home during her days with them.

Ken and the children are on the beach when they arrive at the house and it is an hour before they come back. By this time, Linda, Jane and Ken’s parents are sitting on the veranda over a pot of coffee. The children are friendly and exuberant, glad to have their mother back and full of news of their adventures of the last few days. Ken, too, is polite and friendly but not, Linda thinks, as warm towards Jane as he was at the garden party.

Jane slots into the role of honoured guest, allowing herself to be showered with attention by Ken’s parents, and offering to help where she can. A daily maid’s presence, and the culinary skills of her hosts render this offer redundant.

She does her best to fit into the family atmosphere, focussing a lot of her attention on the children to whom she finds she can relate easily. They seem to warm to her attentions and chat easily to her as the days progress.

Linda lies on the first night as Ken makes love to her, conscious of her lack of choice in what he is doing but not prepared to confront him over it. She thinks of Jane, undoubtedly lying awake in the next room.

Neither she nor Jane refers to the night before they meet to go for a swim in the early morning. They just look at each other and then sit quietly looking out to sea, engulfed by sadness.

Linda seldom leaves Jane’s side, save at bedtime, and an uneasy calm descends on the three adults. Whilst the children, fluent in Spanish by now, are off playing with local friends, Ken drives the two women around the local countryside and along the rugged coast, where they picnic in the quiet sandy coves. It is as pleasant a few days, Linda thinks, as could be possible in these circumstances. Ken makes occasional jibes in private about some aspect of Jane’s personality and about the fact that his summer is being dominated by the presence of a relative stranger. In a moment of exasperation, Linda goes as far as to say that Ken might as well get used to the idea of Jane being around. This is greeted with silence and no more is said. But it is a truce; no more than that.

In the evenings they eat as a large family group with neighbours and relatives from around Llanes who join them. These are happy evenings where language barriers are overcome by Linda and Ken’s translations, by the few words that Jane has picked up and by the goodwill of people wanting to make themselves understood. Time passes quickly.

The evening before Jane’s departure for Santiago airport – a journey she will make

this time with a family member who is travelling in that direction – Linda leaves the dinner party and takes Jane outside onto the veranda to say a quiet farewell. In the cool breeze, they look out over the town lights to the dark sea beyond, two silent people once again facing another goodbye.

Linda reminds Jane of the commitment she made in Santiago and asks if Jane

can wait. Now Linda is asking when Jane has just experienced at first hand Linda having a husband and lover in Ken.

Jane says she will but that it will not be easy. She is near to tears as she speaks. They determine to spend a weekend together at Jane’s flat as soon as Linda can organize something. They hug for the last time in private and Linda risks a fleeting kiss on Jane’s lips.

“I shall miss you, Darling,” she whispers.

“And I you.” There is a choke in Jane’s voice.

Jane returns to the city via London, now with a life-plan that will see her living a relationship at a distance for several years and then living with Linda later on in a home of their own. Linda has agreed with her that they intend to continue to work together at the university, seeing no reason to do otherwise. Linda will keep the relationship secret from work and from Ken. Jane has agreed to respect this, partly against her own instinct to be open and above board about things. But at least they have agreed to socialise with Jane’s friends who, Linda knows, can be trusted. They also have the support and affection of Susan. Maybe it will be possible to create a life for a few years, in which their relationship can be nurtured and developed.

CHAPTER 18

Ken accosts Linda on the evening of Jane’s departure after the children are in bed. This is a man cold with anger and a man who has had time to think and to prepare for what he means to say.

“I saw the kiss on the veranda.” It is a statement full of accusation. “Are you two lovers?”

Linda tells him the truth. There is no point in lying. She simply says, “Yes, Jane is my lover.”

He is a man practically beside himself with pent up fury. She sits in silence as Ken rages at her. He realized that she came back front the Hebrides early. He rang the hotel they stayed in to be told that his wife checked out and left with the rest of the University party. He expected her to arrive home that evening and assumed that she intended to surprise him by coming out early to Spain. He realized something was awry when she rang from her mobile, describing her wet Sunday on the island. He already had his suspicion about Jane from the garden party and was stunned when Linda suggested she intended to invite her to Spain.

Basically, he decided to set a trap for his wife by agreeing to Jane’s visit. This is what infuriates Linda. This energises her to tell it like it is.

If anything, it is a relief to be straight with Ken. He seems cold but calm. She tries to negotiate and reason with him.

“Ken, my love for Jane has nothing to do with my love for him and for the children.”

But, sitting on his parents’ veranda, he flares again, outraged.

“How can you even start to equate our marriage love for whatever it is you think you feel for that tramp?”

She has never seen him so cruel.

“How could you get involved with another woman? It is repulsive, Linda, repulsive – especially the kiss.”

She stares at him, as if by doing so she will make it clear that it is his views, not her kiss, that are repulsive.

“There is no way that I allow any children of mine to be brought up with their mother having an affair with a lesbian.”

He gives her an ultimatum.

“Either you stop this affair right now and get rid of Jane from the University or I divorce you and take the children. And I want ‘proper’ sex restored; none of this lying on your back and letting it happen.”

She listens in silence as his tirade bursts around her head. He is not violent and she has no fear of it. But she watches Ken become someone she has never seen before. He is a man who has the power to take her children. He is a man who has assumed proprietorial rights over her children. He is a man disgusted by her relationship with another woman. He is a man torn by the impotent fury of having no means to combat what he cannot understand – no means except the imposition of threats. In these moments sitting here in the sun, Linda’s emotions for Ken close down. But as they close down, she realizes in that instant that she will not give up the children, no matter what else the cost.

CHAPTER 19

She is tiring of Brenda but she has little choice but to agree to meet her again. The woman is on Susan’s answer phone, her tone neutral, a few evenings after Susan’s evening with Linda and Jane. The last thing that Susan wants is another evening of lamentations over Dave Ramsey but, on the other hand, she needs to know whether Dave had gone ahead with his threatened confession to Brenda and, if he has, how Brenda has reacted.

She allows herself a decent night’s sleep first. It is a sleep that turns out to be heavy with erotic dreams about women together with women and one from which she wakes, surprised at her own excitement. But that feeling is quickly gone from her conscious and reasoning mind. For all that she knows a great deal about sex, she draws a blank when she tries to work out what Jane and Linda do together. Well, what they do together that brings any satisfaction.

“It’s best not to dwell on that,” she thinks as she pours some juice from the fridge, just as she imagines that Linda does not dwell on what she got up to with Alberto, Dave - or anyone else for that matter.

If anything, she is vaguely amused at Linda. Solid, sensible Linda is now taking serious risks with her life, both at work and at home, and she just does not see it. In a way, Linda makes Susan’s indiscretions look minor.

As for those indiscretions, she has concluded that she might well arrange to see this private detective, Paul Shand, and see what he has to say about Ramsey. There is no need to tell Bill in advance – any more than Bill had the courtesy to gain her full agreement for contacting Shand in the first place.

She speaks to Brenda once she has showered. It is a Saturday and they agree to meet again at the Café Noir. If Brenda is in any way antagonistic, she gives no hint of it on the telephone line. If anything, she is almost deferential in her gratitude to Susan for the phone call. They agree on the late morning.

Meanwhile, she finds Paul Shand in the classified directory under ‘Detective Agencies’, and is surprised to see how many of these companies there are. The services that they offer leave her feeling uncomfortable – surveillance, de-bugging, covert photography. She just hopes that she will never be a prey to any of this; that she is not already.

She hears the surprise in Shand’s voice when his secretary puts her through to him but he agrees to see her right away and they set the meeting for ten in his office.

She is vaguely surprised that the building and the office are tolerably smart, just as Bill described them. Still, Susan feels that she is in none too savoury company when she sets eyes on the detective. Oh, he is a good looking and strapping big man all right but she always detested silver chunky bracelets on a man – they speak of a newly moneyed, slightly thuggish style that she simply loathes.

There is no warmth in the greeting. From Shand, she definitely gets the full body once over that suggests that he can now picture her unclothed. He is standing, dressed in a fawn suit and brown shirt with matching tie, more like a gangster than the ex-policeman that his advertising spread in the outer office declares.

“How can I help you, Miss Blakely?” he asks, with none of the respect for the minor celebrity that she is. He sits down before she does, indicating the chair opposite his desk to Susan.

“My partner – fiancée – tells me that he has engaged your services over Dave Ramsey.”

He starts to say something about assured client confidentiality but she waves him aside and continues.

“I know all about it, Mr Shand. Bill sought my agreement before approaching you. We discussed it at length. I am here because he has been detained in Rome and he asked me to check on your progress.”

Shand looks at her, pen held between the fingers of both hands, elbows leaning on the desk. He seems to be deciding whether to deal with her and to conclude that he will accept Susan’s account of why she is there. He is probably playing her along, but Susan decides to take that gamble.

“Of course, I shall be in touch with your fiancée after his return to the city. Meantime, you might like to pass on to him that I have established that Ramsey definitely wrote the letter that Mr Nicolson received.”

She listens as Shand outlines what he knows and how he knows it.

He compared Ramsey’s known handwriting and the letter. Shand declines to say who did the test but indicates that there is no doubt about the competence of the expert. He acquired a sample of Ramsey’s writing by going along to the drop-in café at the church where Ramsey worked and chatting to volunteer staff over a mug of tea. Purporting to be a sympathetic church attendee who had heard of Dave’s hospitalisation, he drew them out about Ramsey’s good works till one of them pointed at the laden notice board and described how Ramsey often tried to keep in touch with the most transient of the visitors by pinning notes up for them. Finding a note on the board half an hour later was easy.

So, he concludes, it can now be taken as fact that Ramsey wrote the letter to Bill.

Susan does not like hearing this. Worse is to come.

“I spoke to Ramsey myself, at the hospital, the day before he was discharged. And I had the distinct impression that this affair with you did happen.” He watches for her reaction.

Susan glares. She is enough of a journalist not to react to the comment about the affair. Instead she asks,

“You spoke to Ramsey? He’s been discharged?”

“Yes, I spoke to him – not as myself. And no, he is still in hospital. I said I was a reporter from the City Tribune called Skidman. Ramsey was none the wiser, especially when I gave him a ‘borrowed’ business card. Skidman is still relatively unknown so there was no way Ramsey could know what he looks like.”

“What did he say?” Susan asks, still banking on her hope that Ramsey would be unlikely to have said anything to jeopardise his own position, especially after her warning to him on the phone. Did this mean, she tries to work out as rapidly as she can, that there was no press involvement; that it was Shand and Shand alone who contacted Ramsey?

“It was more how he didn’t say anything to confirm or deny it. Said he’d think about talking to the press to protect himself in any exposé of you, Miss Blakely. I’d guess that he is now afraid of this leaking out any further. Afraid for himself, I mean. And that leads me to think he’s got something to hide. And that in turn most probably is the Mull business.

“Sounds thin,” observes Susan, caustically. “I don’t see how you can possibly make that deduction and worse, pass that on to Bill. At the end of the day, this man Ramsey is mentally unstable and clearly a fantasising sex freak. I won’t tolerate this, Mr Shand.”

She stands as if to leave but Shand is looking at her very closely and as he scrutinises her face, she realizes that she has walked into a trap of her own making. She is now being questioned and investigated.

“Maybe it does sound thin, Miss Blakely, but I went to see his wife, Brenda. And this is where it gets interesting.”

She sits down.

“Good God. Do you think that was ethical?’ She sounds as outraged as she can.

“Fair, ethical and legal, Miss Blakely. I saw her twice in fact – still as Jeremy Skidman. The first time was at her flat. I said I heard her husband was ill and that there was a rumour that it was to do with an affair he had on Mull. I have to say she looked dumbfounded, then upset and then angry. She all but jammed my hand as she slammed the door. I spoke to her through the letterbox and told her we were as keen at the paper as she was to quash the rumour saying that, after all, he was a young minister with a respected reputation.”

Susan listens, appalled at one level at Shand’s tactics, frightened at another for what Shand might be uncovering and what damage he might be perpetrating through his enquiries.

“The second time I saw her was at the University in the canteen. It was only two days later but I’d say she had aged five rears. I did the sympathy bit,” he laughs, without humour. “Anyway, I said I’d really like to talk to her. I asked her whether Dave had been able to quash the rumour. She just stared at me in a way that said it all. By the looks of it she’s now convinced that Mull happened. I’d hazard a guess she confronted hubby and he spilled the beans.”

Silence falls on the office as Susan takes this in. Was Shand bluffing? Then slowly she says,

“So Ramsey says something happened with someone – me, presumably – and his wife may or may not believe him. That’s hardly conclusive though, is it? Ramsey is still just a fantasizing stalker, Mr Shand.”

“Perhaps it’s not conclusive, Miss Blakely. But it is certainly possible that you and he had a sexual encounter exactly as Ramsey describes it. Did you?”

Susan stands up in a well-played display of outrage.

“I warn you, Mr Shand, you will be very careful what you say about me or you will hear from my solicitor.”

Shand just sits and looks at her, paper knife twirling in his hand, as she leaves his office and as she bangs the door behind her.

The interview has lasted barely fifteen minutes. But it leaves Susan jangled and displaced. How dare Shand, and Bill for that matter, intrude on her privacy like this? Fortunately, she has an hour before seeing Brenda and, more fortunately, she has no car with her. She doubts if she would be steady enough to drive. Her anger would probably make her a menace on the road this morning. She walks the length of the main shopping street, collecting her thoughts and preparing to see what Brenda has made of all this. The question uppermost in her mind is whether Brenda has now swung to believing the reporter and Dave’s confession.

In the coffee house she chooses a booth as far from the earshot of other customers as the limited space allows. Brenda arrives right on time and scans the room with an anxious look on her face until she locates Susan. There is a brief smile of recognition before she walks over. That is reassuring. Susan stands to kiss her briefly on the cheek, sure in that instant that Brenda has much to say.

Having taken on the role, unasked, of mentor and confidante, there is no need for the usual social exchanges of friendship. Susan can see right away that Brenda is strained and asks how she is.

This is a different Brenda today. She is even more burdened and weary and there is a shift from the overriding anxiety that was her predominant emotion during Dave’s time in the hospitals. She is halting with Susan, unsure, and searching Susan’s eyes as she speaks. Susan guesses that she is about to tell her about Shand’s visit. And she is right. It happened on the morning of Dave’s return from hospital. Brenda looks at Susan and tells her that a journalist came to see her about what Susan warned her.

“What?” Susan prompts her, leaning forward with a solicitous and surprised air towards the other woman. “Not Dave’s story about this sexual encounter that he’s dreamed up? Surely not?”

Brenda nods. She was due to collect Dave on the morning of his discharge. When the doorbell rang, she answered it right away and found a pleasant faced man on the doorstep. ‘Mrs Ramsey?’ She nodded, waiting. He told her that his name was Jeremy Skidman and that he worked for the City Tribune. He asked if he could have a word with her about her husband. Brenda’s first thought was that this was something to do with the church where Dave worked. Then the man said that he was trying to quash a rumour about her husband. It was pretty unpleasant really but he was sure that she would be able to clear it up. He said that Dave was having an affair with the well-known TV personality - Susan Blakely.

Susan just looks at Brenda and then groans as if she is every bit as stunned and shocked as any innocent victim of false rumour that has run loose would be. Brenda goes on. At first, she slammed the door in Skidman’s face. It was a reaction from the shock, she tells Susan. But he knocked the door again and she refused to let him in. Skidman called through the letterbox. He was just trying to help. He would come and see her again. Would she ask Dave about it? He could probably clear this up. She said nothing and in a few moments heard footsteps receding down the hall. The man was rude enough to try to talk to her about it on a second occasion when she was having lunch in the university canteen. But she said nothing and asked him to go away.

“Very wise,” Susan comments, as if as a by-the-by.

Susan takes her opportunity.

“Brenda, do you have any doubts at all that it was all false allegations?” She asks in such a way that the answer should surely only be ‘no’.

Brenda looks at her and slowly shakes her head.

“Dave is so proper – disinterested, almost, in that sort of thing. And how on earth would he know someone like you, Susan, other than as an acquaintance, let alone have a relationship with you? You are an important person – fronting TV news and current affairs programmes and all.

Susan does not try to discourage Brenda’s arguments, but puts on a semblance of modesty.

“No,” Brenda insists, “You are such a sophisticated person - so smart by comparison with Dave and me. And you have been so kind and now look. All you’ve had in return is Dave’s ridiculous dreams.”

Susan leans over and touches Brenda’s hand. Brenda is not to worry. No harm has been done and she knows that Dave is an ill man.

“How is Dave now? Is he any better? He’s home, you said?”

Brenda nods, sadly.

“He is home, yes, but everything’s different.” She hesitates and looks at Susan

“I’m being excluded from Dave’s life in so many ways. He is polite, of course, and he appears grateful for the practical things I do like laundry and cooking and so on. But he just won’t discuss anything. He says that he has moved on from wanting to die and is beginning to face the future.”

She looks at Susan as if deciding to say something else. She rather blurts it out.

“There’s something missing now in my own feelings.”

Susan listens to her and seems sympathetic but she is much more concerned to ensure that there is a reliable home base for Dave to return to. Brenda’s presence is one way to keep that man away from her.

“Maybe he is just getting back to normal. It’s been a terrible time for him, Brenda.” Then as if as an idea has struck her she says, “Maybe you should look to expanding your outside interests, go to night classes or take up a sport or something. Give Dave a home base but be a bit less available?”

She thinks quietly to herself that this would be a way of making mousy Brenda more interesting to Dave. Or perhaps in truth it might make her less dull.

“Had you thought much about the future?”

This stumps Brenda. Susan suspects that she has not thought in these terms, taking life until now very much on a day-to-day basis. But once the question has been asked, Susan knows that Brenda will engage her mind on finding an answer.

“Perhaps,” Brenda ponders aloud, “Having children is still an option?”

Susan agrees

“You are both young enough. You and Dave would make caring parents.”

“Anything,” she thinks privately, “to get this couple off my back.”

Brenda looks distressed as she now sighs.

“I had such high hopes for Dave’s return and for how life would be. I thought we would shop and cook together, share plans for the future and maybe,” she blushes,

“Rekindle the private side of things. It would be nicer to have a girl but a boy would be fine, too. I would learn how to cope with a boy.”

Then, finally she asks Susan, in a sudden shift of thinking,

“Should I ask Dave if he had an affair with someone? Not you, of course.” She blushes again.

A tedious hour later, Brenda has talked herself to a position, shared with Susan, where not asking Dave about an affair would be the best option. She will put the past, whatever it contains, behind her and build their lives from here. She feels uneasy with this but she sees the logic of it.

Finally, when it seems safe to pose the question, Susan asks,

“How are you going to handle the real press, if they come?”

Immediately, she realizes her mistake and covers it up.

“Skidman was only small fry, of course.”

Brenda decides, if any other reporter comes, she will take the ‘no comment’ route. This is her best way to support her husband.

Susan leaves Brenda, knowing, she tells the troubled young woman, that Dave is very fortunate in his wife. She just hopes that Brenda will find the inner strength to truly support him. They have a difficult time ahead – this is a first test for them. A baby might be the best thing for them.

The day seems to stretch endlessly ahead of her as she sits in the taxi on her way back to her flat. She is tempted to put the whole sorry saga of Ramsey out of her head but she makes herself do a little recapping.

It certainly now looks as if there is no press interest. Shand and Skidman are one and the same. Jonathon has already dealt with the City Tribune. Dave has obviously not gone down the road of either going to the press or of confessing to Brenda and, all things equal, is going to keep up his no-communication stand with her. Shand is the only threat in terms of his enquiries and what he might tell Bill. But he has been warned about slander and, if necessary, Susan will carry out her threat to seek legal advice. There is nothing that Shand can prove and, even if Ramsey starts squealing, who would believe him? Brenda certainly does not and she is his wife. It looks as if she is safe.

It would be good to celebrate.

CHAPTER 20

The flat is untidy – she has barely had time to unpack after her return from Rome. She should clear up, run a bath and decide what to do with the rest of the weekend. Linda and Jane are probably enjoying the heat of Santiago. Bill is in Elba now. She could pick up her idea of going to see Mike Moss, but she knows where that would inevitably lead.

As she soaks in the bath in the room off her bedroom, her thoughts turn to her last indiscretion with the Italian. That was a nice encounter and so much safer than how things turned out with Ramsey. Alberto had all the sophistication of the international businessman who knows how these things are done. He sat with her, waiting for the same delayed flight from Rome to the city and engineered a seat beside hers on the flight when they eventually boarded. He was a man in his late forties, over to set up a new chain of executive hotels in the cities with flight routes to Rome. He knew how to seduce in the most charming of ways and she accepted his invitation to the hotel he was staying in, sure of her personal safety and of his confidentiality. It was as simple as that.

She is glad that she told Linda a little of all this. She feels better, somehow, for someone else knowing what is going on in her life.

And in her quiet moments, like now in her bath, she does have time for reflection. Her strongest feeling is that she has had a lucky escape over the Ramsey business. She feels an emotional frisson of fear at how differently the whole business could have worked out.

In her most private thoughts, she dwells on her sexual encounter with Ramsey, and with other men she has met on this basis. She does not profess to understand these sexual desires. But they have to be linked to a lack of affect in what she considers to be her real relationships – she does not know how else to describe the difference between her feelings for, say, Ramsey and, say, Bill. But she knows there has to be a connection between the lack of commitment she makes in her relationships and the anonymous sex to which she is attracted. Is it attraction, she wonders, or is it a compulsion, this anonymous sex?

And what of her wanderings? She uses the word wryly, laughing to herself as she soaps her arms. Her conclusion is surprising, even to herself. If you can’t beat it, she concludes, don’t fight it. She knows she could think about this till the cows come home and convince herself that she will not have anonymous sex again. She has done that often enough in the past. But she does not hold to it. It is a switch in her that simply turns on, in a particular set of circumstances. Sure, she could try to avoid the circumstances but, at the end of the day, it will happen again. All she can do, really, is ensure her personal safety and protect her job. And keep it from Bill.

The weekend is too long and she knows before she is out of the bath that that switch in her psyche has just switched on once again. Perhaps Alberto is still in town? Seeing him for a second time would still be uncomplicated, after all. He will return to Italy as soon as his business is done and that will be the end of it. And Bill is safely out of the country. Why not?

She rings the hotel. It as the biggest and the most expensive in the city and no questions will be asked there. Yes, her Italian friend is still a guest. His name transpires to be Senor Paccini. They put her through. She can hear the pleasure in his voice right away. She deliberately has not told him where she lives and he says that he so wants to see her again. Yes, she would love to join him for dinner. Eight o’clock would be fine.

That gives her time to take Bill’s seven-thirty call from Elba and then to taxi into the centre. She chooses a short sleeved cream dress that is tight at the waist and swirls wide around her ankles. It would be hard for any man to resist this, she decides.

She is at the hotel by eight to find Alberto sitting in the foyer lounge, waiting for her. He greets her with a smile and a kiss to both cheeks, and he escorts her through to the dining room bar. He checks whether she would like champagne and nods to the waiter.

“I thought you might not come, Susan,” he smiles as the cork is eased silently from the bottle. He has more of a boyish grin than a smile. She is charmed by the Italian accent.

“So did I,” she laughs, realizing that this man whom she met so recently and allowed to seduce her is actually a very attractive person indeed. She paid little attention to the tall, slim, dark Roman features on the evening of the flight home, already slightly befuddled by alcohol very soon after he introduced himself.

Dinner is pleasant and becomes more intimate as the meal progresses. His knee manages to touch hers and he makes it very clear in what he says and how he looks at her as to how he would like the evening to end. When he asks her what she particularly likes to do to her men, she feels herself tighten and a rush of sensation between her legs. But she keeps him guessing, thinking that she will make the session different from their first and she turns the question back on him. He likes to have his women naked whilst he remains clothed – at first, anyway. He is much more to the point than any British counterpart she has met.

Over desert, he simply announces,

“Susan, I want to make love with you. Now. Come upstairs for brandy and coffee.”

He stands up, expecting and knowing that she will follow and she appears at least to be subservient, obedient to the mastery of this sophisticated man. He leads the way to the second floor, unlocks his door to reveal a sitting room with bedroom beyond. Brandy and coffee are already set out. He sits her down in a fireside chair, sits opposite her and pours two glasses of amber liquid. She takes a sip and asks for the direction of the bathroom. It is through the bedroom.

In the bathroom, she takes off all her clothes, leaving on only her heels and comes back to frame herself in the doorway.

He stays sitting, and she watches him stiffen through his trousers.

“Very nice, little girl. Come here.”

As if obedient, she goes over, stands in front of him and then goes down on to her knees. Kneeling, she opens his zip and slips it down. She watches him watching, waiting for her head to go down. She keeps him waiting, teasing him till he is shifting in the chair. He holds her head in his hands, moving her up and down at his own speed. But he stops and she helps him out of his clothes, before rising on to his lap. Minutes later, he slumps and she comes off him. He holds her, cradled child-like, for a few minutes.

He starts to mutter words of gratitude. But Susan freezes, emotionally closed down already, and wanting to leave. Alberto obviously thinks that this was just the start of their night together and he is stunned when she goes back into the bathroom and returns five minutes later, dressed and evidently about to leave. He protests and asks her to stay the night, to enjoy the bed together. She says she has to work next day, and has to leave. But he insists angrily, and, taking a decision to err on the side of safety, she allows him to put her on to her back on the bed and to take her again, her clothes around her waist. This is one way to be safe.

She has closed down; has to be alone; wants away. She extricates herself with promises she does not intend to keep and knows that the Italian is close to fury at her hasty departure. A sense of relief comes over her as she sits in the taxi – relief that she has left; relief that she has not given him her address or telephone number.

And in her own bed, showered and cleansed, she knows that this was another Mr Anybody as far as she is concerned and not a relationship in any sense of the word. She does not want to see him again. Being rid of him is being rid of that part of herself that she does not understand and which is, ultimately, dangerous to her in every sense. At least, she thinks, she is rid of it for the time being.

Susan Blakely does an unusual thing for her, that night – she cries herself to sleep. In those tears, tears of communication with her inner self, is grief. It is grief for the person that she now fully understands herself to be. In the grief, is acceptance.

Over the next few days, she does everything she can to put the episode out of her head. She reverts to being business-like and to making a number of professional links that were outstanding at the end of the series. Her professional persona is the surest antidote that she has to the emotional chaos she experiences after an encounter like the one with Alberto. Being Susan Blakely, chat show host and social commentator, holds her safe from the memory of her behaviour and from the feelings of repugnance that they hold for her after the event.

CHAPTER 21

The TV contract when it came was for only ten, and not the usual twenty, programmes. She signed, of course, but could get no clear explanation for the intention to run ‘Live Tonight’ only till Christmas. She rings Bill to sound off about it all, and leaves a message for him. She is preparing to go off to bed when the call comes. She automatically lifts the handset, assuming that it is Bill, who is due back to the city this evening. He will be round to stay the night, provided that the flight is not too seriously delayed. Susan is more than ready to see him, to re-establish herself with him.

But it is Brenda – sobbing down the phone and angry. Susan tries to calm her and to elicit from her what has happened. But it is clear very quickly that Brenda’s anger is focussed on Susan.

Dave told Brenda about Susan after tea that evening. His reason for doing so, he said, was to clear his conscience. Susan does not get any of the details from Brenda – just that Dave told her that he was unfaithful to her on Mull with Susan. He has been so consumed by guilt ever since that he eventually decided he had no choice but to end his life; hence the suicide attempt. He could not face her or the church.

“Brenda,” Susan eventually interrupts, “You don’t believe any of this, do you?”

The phone line is silent. Susan waits. She breaks the silence.

“Brenda?”

“I think I do, Miss Blakely. Why would he lie?” Brenda has reverted to using Susan’s surname and Susan knows that she has a fight on her hands to hold Brenda’s confidence.

“He would lie, Brenda, because he is ill, and probably has come to believe it all himself. That will be why it all sounds so convincing. Can’t you see that?”

Brenda is so easily manipulated. Within a few seconds she begins to calm and Susan can hear tears of certainty of Dave’s unfaithfulness change to those of doubtful relief. Susan encourages her to tell her what else Dave has been saying. Brenda begins to open up.

“The church wants him to complete his post-graduate studies and to stay here with me whilst he does some academic and legal work for them. They think this will be a good way for him to get better and they obviously think he can be a minister again, sometime in the future. He has asked me to help him.”

Brenda shifts tack again, checking something else out with Susan. She asks why Dave felt the need to be unfaithful.

“He said that he felt sorry for you, Susan. He said you hadn’t done much work like the boat tragedy and that you were actually very upset. It was comfort, really, that’s how it started. Then when he realized what he’d done, he tried to stop you going to see him. But he says that you clung on and then when he got really firm you must have built up resentment till you tried to get revenge by going to the church authorities. He thinks that it’s very sad that anyone should be so desperate. Is it true, Miss Blakely?”

Susan listens, seething at the twisted version of the facts designed to bolster up Ramsey’s image to his wife. Then she laughs, a sympathetic, pitying laugh.

“Oh dear, Brenda, He really is not at all well, is he? He did say something, now that I come to think about it, when I saw him in hospital. It was about me going to the church on Mull. I didn’t give that much thought at the time. What a dreadful thing it must be to feel so, so paranoid, I suppose it would be.”

She hears Brenda’s tone change again as Brenda falls into the sympathy trap set for her. The woman’s tone suddenly has a steel about it that Susan has not heard before.

“You know, for the first time in our marriage, Dave is the one who is vulnerable, vulnerable to how I will react. I rather like the feeling. He needs to stay with me – the church wants it that way. He needs me to agree to that.”

Susan can see that Dave may only have been home for just a few days but in that time the nature of his relationship with Brenda has changed. Later, it might dawn even on Brenda that for the first time she holds some power. Then Brenda confides something else. Dave had sex with her, without asking her, on the night before his confession to her. He did it, wordless, and then lay quiet in darkness. It did not occur to her to resist.

Susan uses this information to say that Dave must still be in a very labile state. Brenda will need to be more assertive about what her conditions are for living with him as well as being tolerant of his confusion. What can she do to support Brenda, she enquires, her voice full of concern?

Brenda says that Susan has already done the one thing that mattered. She helped her to get Dave’s confession into perspective. She has the energy to go on from here. And she is very grateful to Susan.

Later that evening, Susan lets herself fold back into the relationship with her now bronzed Bill, listening as he tells her about his solitary trip and about how he missed her. Will she please consent to marrying him? They have waited long enough.

She accepts, almost to her surprise, and with no doubt as to her motives in her mind. But she sets down one condition. He will be fully open with her from now on. He is not to go off and do things like engaging private detectives or anything else that affects them both, for that matter, without them being both in full accord. He agrees. She drifts off to sleep much later with a sense of security that she has not had since her father and mother were alive. In their absence, she wants Linda to be the first to know about her wedding to come. Her only niggle is about that shortened TV contract.

CHAPTER 22

Just four days after her encounter with Ken, Linda left Llanes and flew to London, saying to him that she needed time to think. She explained to Angela and Kenny that something had come up at work and that she needed to be in London for a day or two. She did not ring Jane. Instead, she booked into a hotel room just off Oxford Street and spent two days wandering the city, lost in her own thoughts. She spoke to no one, ate in a small restaurant near the hotel and decided on her future. Only when she had sorted out her thoughts and emotions did she get on a flight back to the city.

Now she is met when she rings the outer doorbell by the voice of Jane, anxiety and relief in her young lover’s voice both at once. Jane is already in the corridor when Linda comes out of the lift and in Linda’s arms without any thought for outward appearances.

“Where have you been? I’ve been frantic. You didn’t ring and then I eventually called Llanes. Ken answered but he hung up.”

Linda holds her, arms around her and easing her into the flat. They stand behind the closing door, kisses blocking out their words.

“He knows.”

That is all she needs to say and it is obvious from Jane’s nod of the head that she suspected as much. She sits with Jane on one of the sofas, the collage above them, as she tells her lover about the ultimatum that Ken delivered and his threat to take the children. She tells Jane how he wanted the affair, as he described it, to end and Jane to be removed from the University.

Jane listens, silent and shocked.

“Jane, I can’t risk the children. There’s no question of you losing your job. That’s not even in my power. Even if it were, I wouldn’t do anything like that. But I can’t ruin the children’s lives.”

Linda watches Jane’s expression of grief overwhelm her. But she pushes on with what she is determined to say, what she feels is her only real option.

“I hate Ken now and I don’t think that will change. But I only have one way out of

this and that is to finish it between you and me, at least for now. We’ll see each other at work – that is, if you agree to stay around. Jane, I ask too much of you and I have no right to expect you to agree. But would you stay around? And wait for me? This is years we are talking about and I know it. But one day the children will be grown and will leave home. But nothing and no-one has mattered to me like this.”

“Except the children.” Jane hears and obviously regrets her own bitterness.

“It’s different, Darling. I have a duty to those two. They will grow up and leave.

What I feel for you will continue.”

They cry – Jane especially. Linda has had more time to deal with the shock of Ken’s ultimatum and is more resolved in her decision. She can only see Ken’s behaviour as vicious and not yet as the act of a hurt man, desperately trying to protect his family and himself. In coming back to the city via London and ahead of Ken and the children, Linda has taken time to make her decision on her own.

This is how they spend what is now their last evening together, weeping and recounting their relationship to each other in order to cement it in a shared memory and to create the only blanket of comfort they will have in the weeks and months ahead. Jane has no option; she knows that Linda is beyond persuasion.

At first, she says she will think about what Linda is asking of her but she lies in

the dark, Linda in her arms, and she takes her decision. In reality, she sighs, she chose as soon as Linda told her the situation. She holds her naked partner and tells her she will wait. She will be lonely and she will grieve. She will watch Linda from afar at the University. She will decline any social engagements that could bring them together and she will watch, as Linda’s two young teenagers became young adults.

And if they make it, Linda and she, it will be worth the wait. If time and events are such that they do not make it, Jane will have the peace of mind of knowing that she tried for the best. Nothing else will do in these circumstances.

Lecturer and professor, they will return to work the following month, joined by their love, separated by Linda’s circumstances.

Lying with Linda in the dark, she whispers that she knows that she should perhaps move on to a new job in a different university, perhaps in a different European country. But she decides on this, their last night, that this is the relationship that will be the most significant of her life. She will give herself another few academic years, see the next summer excavation through and the research written up and then decide how she feels then. Provided she can bear the pain of separation, she will wait. Meanwhile, Jacky and Nicola will help her to live some sort of social existence.

The sad thing is, she reflects to Linda, that when you are attracted to someone like this you cannot want to not feel like this – no matter how unattainable the person is. It is, she said, a true contradiction in terms.

They make love in the quiet of the dawn, their shapes silhouetted in the early light. Neither has much sleep and they doze for just a few hours after that, waking simultaneously to the knowledge that they now have to separate. Linda’s only comfort as she stands for the final time in the arms of her true partner is that she will at least see her in the University. There is nothing that Ken can do about that. Her last words as the door of the elevator closes are “Wait for me, Jane”. The last sight she has is Jane’s nod of assent.

Linda drives back to the house, tears making the journey unsafe but she composes herself as best she can before she enters the family drive. The children are due back today with Ken and she wants to have a brave face for them; a stolid face for him. Tina is at the house when she arrives; just back from her own holiday in France and seeing right away that all is not well with Linda. But Linda makes it clear without saying anything that she should not ask and Tina respects that. Instead, they busy themselves with preparations for the days ahead, bringing the rooms up to temperature, making shopping lists and deciding what needs to be done by whom for the children’s return to school.

They hear the front door open somewhere towards three o’clock. And the children are there, Angela running to find them both with a huge hug for her mother and a grin and a hug for Tina. It is clear from Angela and Kenny’s demeanours that they are oblivious to the problem between their parents. Amid the bustle there is only time for Linda to simply acknowledge Ken. He heads off to their bedroom and she helps Angela unpack, and listens to her account of the flights home. Enjoying the buzz in the house and seeing Kenny make straight for his computer, she knows her decision to stay with the children is the right one. She finally goes to find Ken. He is piling dirty washing into the hamper in the dressing room.

“Well? Have you decided what you are going to do?” he growls as he straightens to look at her.

“I stay with my children, Ken. And we make the best of it that we can. But I warn you – I will not tolerate you doing anything to harm Jane. She will be continuing at the University. I shall see her in the context of work – but that is all.”

Ken looks at her, about to say something but checking himself. Instead, he turns and walks out of the room. A war of silence is about to start – Linda can see that. This is not new. It is something that has happened about smaller issues over the years. If the pattern follows true to form, it will be a week or so till the atmosphere thaws. How much the children pick up on these occasions she never knows, as husband and wife both keep up a front for their sakes.

Sure enough, by the next morning the marital bed has been an icy place but everything looks normal to all outward appearances. Linda is low and she needs to see Susan. Well, she needs to see Jane but she knows that if she does not now resist the temptation to just get in the car and go round, she will never make the break. And that could cost her the children. So she rings Susan instead.

Susan is surprised to hear that she is at home, thinking that Linda was not due back from Spain for several days yet. Linda tells her that things have changed and that she needs to see her. They agree on the One-to-One, a fashionable new restaurant that has just been written up in the weekend broadsheet. Neither of them has visited it before.

Linda barely listens as Susan talks animatedly about how she is getting back into the swing of preparations for the new series. The first studio debate will be fierce, Susan says. But she has more personal news for Linda but she will keep it till they meet for dinner.

Linda spends the day seeing to the purchase of new school gear for Angela and Kenny, both of who trail behind her with such disinterest that she is almost exasperated. She knows, though, that what she really is suffering is the frustration of not being with Jane. She finds herself scanning the shoppers for a sighting of her, knowing full well that Jane loathes the crowds and is probably miles away.

The One-to-One proves to be a small restaurant on a steep side street near the station. A taxi rank stands at the top of the road and the road itself is narrow and dimly lit. The cobbles make Linda’s decent from her taxi and into the restaurant rather slippery. Linda looks at the smart exterior, thinking that for all the style of the eating-house itself, she would not like to walk this street in the dark on her own. The taxi drops her near to the door and she makes her way into the dimly lit, wooden floored room where only a couple of tables are already taken.

She is there by seven thirty and it is just a couple of minutes later that Susan enters. She is smiling and obviously not the worried Susan of just a few weeks ago. Linda wonders how she will find the energy to be with her friend. Then she puts the thought aside, recognising that she is being more than selfish.

“Linda. Hello. What on earth is the matter?” Susan hugs her friend, seeing at once that all is not well. She waits for them both to sit down. Linda sits to her left, takes some wine that is brought for them and struggles for composure. There is a quiver in her voice as she speaks.

Slowly, painfully, she tells Susan about her time in Spain with Jane, about Ken’s ultimatum to her and her decision to stop seeing Jane in order to protect the children. Susan listens quietly and sympathetically, the hurt for her friend showing on her face. But she is obviously not surprised at the turn of events.

She asks one question.

“Can you stick to this decision? I know what Jane means to you.”

“I don’t have a choice, Susan. I can’t risk losing the children. And I can’t risk destroying their childhoods.”

“Seems to me you are being blackmailed by that husband of yours. How do you settle back into your marriage after this?”

Linda hears the word blackmail for the second time. This is what Jane said.

“I have no idea. It’s all very new and raw just now. I can hardly bear Ken at the moment. There’s a silent war going on between us. We only speak to keep up appearances with the children. I don’t take kindly to being manipulated, especially if I have to give in.”

“Linda, the main thing seems to be that you are assuming you would lose the children. Have you thought about seeking legal advice about a divorce and custody of the children? You are also assuming that they could not cope with you and Jane as a couple. Children are resilient these days and from all accounts, adjust very quickly to same-sex relationships. There seem to be plenty of examples of it.”

Linda listens, thinking about these points as if for the first time. Susan has dealt with these issues before in the TV studio, she recalls, and is well versed in principal, at least, about these sorts of issues. But for now at least, Linda is not ready to contemplate changes that would mean taking the risk that she might lose the children. She spends a while talking about Jane, about her feelings of loss and about how it will be to have her still working at the department. She tells Susan that she and Jane want to be together when the children are grown. Susan thinks such long term planning is dubious and says so. She does not see how any couple can sustain a wait of such a lengthy period. She risks teasing her friend.

“I bet you two see each other secretly. You’ll be tucked up in bed again in a month – you’ll see.”

Linda shakes her head. She couldn’t risk it. That would be a sure way to provoke Ken into action if he ever found out.

“Need he find out?” asks Susan, pragmatic as usual.

Linda sits silent, clearly contemplating a dim future. They eat and talk more but Linda is not ready to change her decision about Jane – it is after all, only a few days old. She says something to that effect.

“I suppose it’s like the first few days of any decision, like going on a diet for example. You are enthusiastic about eating nothing for a while and then you get hungry.” Linda smiles for the first time at this analogy. She laughs and said she will see how the diet goes.

The conversation turns to Susan and her decision to marry Bill. Linda thinks it is an on-balance good decision. She is genuinely pleased for Susan in a quiet way. She has no energy tonight for effusive delight. And she is quieter still when Susan tells her just about everything that happened since they were together. She tells her about Alberto Paccini and her one night stand with him, omitting only the sexual detail of her encounter with Alberto.

All she can do is be as pragmatic in her turn about Alberto as Susan is towards her relationship with Jane. Susan reveals that Alberto has found out where she works because of a TV preview being put out on the air for the new series. He sent her an E-Mail asking to see her again. Susan is not going to do that, though, now that Bill is back in the city. Alberto was angry when Susan left the hotel and she does not want another man in a rage chasing her.

Linda reinforces Susan’s decision not to see Alberto, saying that her friend needs to draw a line under her anonymous sexual encounters if her marriage is to work. That is, of course, if she can draw the line. This gets a doubtful expression from Susan.

“Well at least Alberto sounds a lot safer bet than Ramsey,” Linda observes, as if taking the line of least resistance. But she also has to confess that she cannot imagine having a sexual encounter and then immediately agreeing to marry someone else.

Susan needs to explain to her. Slowly, clearly feeling her own humiliation, she now tries to tell Linda about the kind of person she is. Eventually, she describes the kind of sexual drive that overtakes her and leads her to anonymous encounters. Linda just listens as Susan describes her power lust in these encounters. Curiously, she finds she has no sense of being judgmental.

“This really troubles you, Susan, doesn’t it?” That is all Linda says but it brings Susan near to tears as she faces the pain inside her in front of her sympathetic listener.

“Yes,” is all she manages in reply then, as Linda still sits silent, she says, “I don’t see how I can ever make a good and lasting relationship. I’m at the stage of thinking that this is how my life is going to be.”

“It doesn’t have to be, you know. And marrying Bill is probably the single most sensible thing that you can do. This part of you is probably something quite simple from your past. It has made you feel – whatever it is. Perhaps it is a need to dominate and humiliate. It’s not extreme, you know. Plenty of people have sexual fantasies like your actual experiences. Usually, they just keep them to themselves or act them out behind the marital bedroom door. All that’s different is that you do it with strangers. And that in turn may simply be because you have opportunities that most women don’t. Most women are confined to jobs nine o’clock to five, and confined with children to see to, five o’clock to nine. Remember the old adage about goodness being lack of opportunity. All I’m concerned about is the danger element. Or maybe,” she adds, a new thought occurring to her, “You need the element of danger?”

Susan looks at her as if this is also a new idea to her.

“I rather suspect that your marriage to Bill will change you. And that you will settle down. There is enough between you for real love to grow over time. I’ve seen you together, so I don’t say this idly.”

“That’s what I’m hoping, Linda. In fact, I’m hoping for rather a lot from this marriage.”

Susan says that she feels a bit more ordinary somehow, for her friend’s words. She wants to dwell privately on what has been said before talking again to Linda. She knows that she needs Linda’s friendship right now in a way she has not experienced before. She says so.

Now, as the wine relaxes them, they find themselves exploring their friendship and the value of it to each of them. It has changed in the last months from being an important bolthole in each of their lives, a place where the ordinary problems of each of their lives can be shared. It is now a place that holds the deepest secrets that each of them is ever likely to have. Short of making it a dangerous place because of that, it is somehow safer. It is a place now that matters to each of them and where they can be certain that the interests of the other will be protected from outward scrutiny. It is a place that Linda knows she can trust. And it is a friendship, Susan observes, which compensates for the loneliness she has somewhere deep in her soul.

It is ten thirty or so when they leave the restaurant. They have barely noticed the food as they talked, just knowing that it was good. They leave the restaurant with their arms linked and their collars up against the first chill of autumn. Linda takes the outside, Susan falling into step beside her. They walk slowly up the one-way street towards the main road and the taxi rank up ahead of them. The pavement is uneven and takes some of their attention as they chat about ordinary domestic plans for the weekend to come.

It is Linda who turns in time to see the headlamps of a vehicle coming towards them. It takes her a split second to realize something is very wrong. The vehicle is coming straight at them. She freezes. Then, coming to her senses, she pushes Susan with all her force towards the wall. That is the last that she remembers. She blacks out.

CHAPTER 23

A dark haired, moustached man is standing over her. For just a second, she thinks that this must be another sexual encounter. But as her vision clears she realizes that she is in a hospital room and that a nurse is standing by monitors at the bedside. Bill is sitting by the bed, his hand holding hers.

She has no idea why she is here.

“What happened?” she asks of no one in particular.

“How are you feeling?” the nurse asks, reaching to feel Susan’s pulse.

Bill answers her question.

“There was a car accident, Darling.”

It comes back to her now – Linda pushing her off her feet; the sight of a doorway coming towards her.

“Linda? Is Linda all right?”

“Professor Pilar is doing fine, Miss Blakely,” the dark complexioned man now comes in. “She is in the hospital here and making good progress. My name is Peter Philips – Inspector Philips, CID. We believe that the car that drove towards you did so deliberately. We intend to find out who did this and why. For the moment, there is a policewoman outside your door for your safety and I would like to talk with you as soon as you feel well enough and the doctor gives me the word.”

She is hazy still, only now wanting to know how badly she is hurt. She turns to Bill as the Inspector leaves the room.

“How bad am I?”

“Not too bad, my Darling. You were concussed and you have a lot of bruises. But the car did not hit you. You struck your head, or so they think, against a shop door. And you were in shock for a while so they sedated you. You’ve been in and out of sleep all night.”

So it is Saturday.

“But what about Linda?”

“A broken leg, a pretty bad gash on the leg where the bone came through and multiple bruises. And she is very shocked. But she will make a full recovery. You’ll see her soon.”

Susan drifts off, her last thoughts those of trying to recapture lost hours of her life. When she wakes again, Bill is not there. She looks at her watch. It is four o’clock. She must have slept all day. The policewoman rises and comes in, having alerted a doctor that Susan is awake. The doctor follows a few seconds later and Susan is aware that she is feeling better than she did earlier. She starts to sit up and the nurse comes to her assistance as she feels a piercing pain in her head that jars her eyes. The doctor examines her, Susan wanting to be the one to ask the questions but in too much pain around her head and ribcage to protest much.

In answer to her unspoken question, the doctor tells her that he is sure that she is going to be fine but that they want to do a further CT scan to make sure that there is no injury beyond the concussion. Does she feel up to talking to the police inspector? She agrees, feeling trapped and eager to be out of here and to see Linda. But she has the distinct impression from the young policewoman that she is going nowhere until she has spoken to the police. They obviously want her before anyone else speaks to her. She watches as the policewoman radios to her station and Inspector Philips seems to almost beam himself from somewhere to the bedside.

He seems a quiet and deep person, not her image of a police detective at all. His eyes search hers, as if just looking at her will tell him what he needs to know to do his enquiry. He has two sets of questions. What does she remember and who might have reason to harm her?

On the first, she has little to say. It takes her only a moment to recount the little that she saw before being knocked out. She did not see the vehicle and only realized that something was very wrong when Linda pushed her. Her only thought was to protect her face from the advancing wall. The second question is harder. She has no choice but to name Ramsey and to recount his threats. Peter Philips has done his homework. He already knows about the attempted suicide and the message on her answer phone. He listened to it before coming to see her just now. Ramsey is out of hospital. He has motive and opportunity. Why does Ramsey think that he has a grudge against her? She tells the tale of the early meeting on the island, Ramsey’s unwanted advances and his pestering of her. She tells Inspector Philips how she tried to support his poor wife, Brenda, and how Ramsey threatened her when she saw him in psychiatric hospital. All the while, Peter Philips scrutinises her face, listening hard, asking few questions so that she feels she has to explain herself more and more.

She goes automatically into role. She is a woman very much in the public eye and someone whose job and reputation are based on sound moral stands on social issues. So she did her best to help the young couple. Still he scrutinises her face. Who else might have had reason to hurt her? No one, is her genuine response. And who might want to harm Professor Pilar? Again, she is honest in her reply. No one would want to harm Linda – she is a highly liked member of her profession and social circle. It is much more likely that this was a random hit and run, wasn’t it, she queries, gathering her thoughts now and making a rear guard attempt to deflect public attention from Ramsey and herself. How could the police be sure that the attack was deliberate? Inspector Philips is quite clear – a taxi driver, sitting at the front of the queue in the rank witnessed the car accelerate straight for the two women. The taxi driver did not have time to see who was driving, but he is sure that it was quite deliberate and that the car pulled from the kerb just as Linda and she emerged from the restaurant. Could it have been a random attack, she now pushes the Inspector again, still trying to open out the range of possibilities. He concedes that it is possible, either just a case of the two women being in the wrong place at the wrong time or some stranger who had it in for a TV personality. They would explore all the possibilities, of course. If there is anything else that she remembers will she please be in touch with him via the policewoman, right away?

Of course she will. She needs protection from whoever did this and from what the press might make of it.

She pushes Philips about her privacy. He will be saying as little as possible to the press. All that the police have done so far is confirm that there has been a hit and run accident and that she and the professor are comfortable in hospital.

It now comes as an unpleasant surprise to Susan to hear that the news was the main item on all the morning TV and radio bulletins. When she stops to think about it, she sees that it is inevitable that it is already in the public domain. Well at least, she decides, it should enhance the sympathy for her if it is handled properly by the TV Company. The newspapers will undoubtedly have the story by the evening editions and it will be in the Sundays. The police, the Inspector assures her, are keeping journalists away from Linda and herself.

Philips leaves after about thirty minutes, leaving Susan exhausted with the interview and with the pain, not to mention with grasping the ramifications of the fact that someone has tried to kill her and Linda. She can only assume that she, and not Linda, was the target and that she is inadvertently the cause of Linda being injured. She is struggling to get out of bed when Bill reappears.

“I have to see Linda,” she gasps, reaching out for his hand.

But Bill indicates that the Inspector is interviewing Linda and that he will take her along as soon as that is over.

He settles her back against the pillows, smoothing her forehead and encouraging her to rest. She is happy to let him stroke her, painful as her face is, and she listens as he talks to her about the police enquiries. The police interviewed him but they were polite and clearly seem to be following a definite line of enquiry – Dave Ramsey. Did he know Ramsey and was Ramsey a friend of Miss Blakely? And yes – the police knew about him from the time of the suicide phone call and taking the tape. Bill decided at first to say nothing about the anonymous letter but he tells Susan that he had to do so.

“I assume you agree?” He sees Susan hesitate and goes straight on, “But we don’t need to worry about this immediately.”

Susan is not at all sure that she does agree but she is too ill to do anything other than listen.

Bill tells her that he answered the Inspector’s questions as carefully as possible but decided to say nothing about engaging Shand. He told them that he knew Ramsey was a minister and that Susan interviewed him on Mull. Ramsey pestered Susan after that and she eventually had a suicide note from him. He has not met Ramsey himself; no. As far as he is aware, there was no contact between Susan and Ramsey for years and, no, Susan did see Ramsey after the suicide attempt, other than on the ward of the psychiatric hospital.

He was over a barrel, he tells Susan, when the Inspector asked him whether there was any more information that he was aware of that could help the police. He decided that he had no choice. He might be challenged, he argued, with withholding information. He told them about the anonymous letter and arranged for it to be collected later in the day when he returned to the flat. He impressed on the Inspector the sensitivity of its contents. The Inspector asked for Bill’s continuing assistance.

Susan lies there, eyes closed and feeling as if her control of her own privacy has just evaporated further.

In response to their final question, he could not think of anyone else who would wish to harm Susan and, although he only knew Linda Pilar as a social acquaintance, he had no reason to believe that anyone would want to hurt her. In turn, he asked the Inspector if it was possible that it was a random attack or that it was a car stolen by kids and out of control. The Inspector volunteered that they were satisfied that it was deliberate – the witness account certainly points to the possibility that the car was sitting idling and moved as soon as the two women left the restaurant.

Susan wonders what the Inspector will make of the anonymous letter and the stick people when he sees it. She remembers the scrutiny in his eyes. It as if she is being exposed to the world for all to see.

Bill sits with her for a while, but she persuades him to go and eat towards six o’clock. She needs to sleep again and there is still no word that she can go and see Linda. She wonders how she will face her friend. What can she possibly say to her?

When she wakes again, Ken Pilar has come in to see her. She asks for Linda. Ken is exhausted and pale. He is cool but at pains to reassure Susan that Linda is going to be fine – it will just take a little while. Linda sends her love and is hoping that Susan will be well enough to get along to see her very soon.

Ken says that the police are asking questions about Ramsey. The police, he tells Susan, seem to be unclear as to whether Susan or Linda was the target. Susan registers some surprise at this news but says nothing. Maybe they are just checking every possibility.

She drifts into a deep sleep and has no memory when she wakes the next morning of when Ken left. Bill is once again at the bedside. He has spent a restless Saturday evening and night alone in his flat. A suicide dream he had a few weeks ago about a dead man talking about his suicide came back to him but this time the man was death itself driving an open top car straight at him. He woke, drenched and afraid, wondering what the last moments of Susan and Linda’s walk were like for them. Susan takes his hand, her turn now to comfort someone affected by what happened to her.

Before coming into hospital on the Sunday morning, Bill rose reasonably early, shaken into wakefulness by the dream. He went round to Susan’s flat and packed what he could think of by way of her toiletries, a fresh nightdress and clothes for when she is discharged. He realized that her clothes of the Friday evening would not be wearable and that it was probable anyway that the police had her outer garments for any forensic matching to the impact vehicle as and when it was found. He found shoes, trousers and a sweater that he has seen her wearing for leisure around the flat on a number of their evenings together.

With all these in one of her holdalls, he added a bouquet of yellow roses to his packages and returned to the hospital at about nine. She feels nurtured and cared for; and it is a new experience for Susan to allow this level of concern from someone.

She is more alert this morning and eager to have a proper wash using her own soap and creams – hospital toiletries are basic to say the least.

“How is your head?” Bill enquires as a nurse relieves him of the flowers and heads off in search of a vase.

“Better. But I’m tired. And my neck is sore,” she responds. But her main thought is for her injured friend.

“I need to see Linda, Bill. She’s in a bad way – worse than me. This is my fault.”

Tears well in her eyes, genuine tears for the pain she feels she has inadvertently caused her friend.

“No, Susan, this is not your fault. No matter why this happened, you did not do this to Linda. The person who drove that car is responsible.”

“That’s what Linda will say,” Susan replies, not believing it herself for one second.

“She’s going to be fine, Susan. I’ll call in on her today. I just wanted to be here with you. Susan,” he asks now, “How much do you remember of what happened?”

“Not everything. Flashes, just. I remember the wall. That’s really all. I don’t think I’ll ever forget that, Bill” She knows how true that is.

“It all seemed like slow motion. It took me ages to realize. They told me that Linda grabbed me and pushed me out of the way. If she hadn’t done that, Bill – if she had jumped out of the way and saved herself – she might not have been injured.”

“Susan, what Linda did was on instinct and it was on instinct to protect you. You have absolutely nothing to reproach yourself for.”

She takes comfort from his words. She is still exhausted, and Bill spends most of the time just sitting quietly in the room, well shielded from the press who, apparently are hovering outside the ward, by tight police security. He asks to speak to a doctor at one point and sees a junior houseman. He reports back to her that she should be ready for discharge within a day or two; that all the head scan tests are clear and that she is a resilient woman. He says that she will be offered tranquillisers for her return home. She knows this already. She will refuse; she decided that right away. The doctor warned Bill that she was likely to have recurrent flashbacks and to waken in the night. She can expect these reactions even though she has no memory of the accident. But Susan is determined that nothing is going to set her on the path of taking mind altering drugs.

She limps off to shower and to change from the hospital gown into her own nightdress. For the first time she looks into a mirror. Beneath her matted hair is a face she barely recognises as her own. She is swollen and bruised with dark blue and red colour from her eyes to the base of her cheeks. How did she escape a broken nose? But, short of thinking that her injuries are serious, she realises just how fortunate she has been. That thought makes her feel faint and she has to clutch the edge of the sink. She makes a mental note in her professional mind as she showers to do more about assaulted women on her show. This is how they must feel.

In the late morning, Susan’s boss, Jonathon, comes in, awkwardly carrying a bunch of carnations, no doubt bought from the outlet in the hospital foyer. It is, she thinks, a nice gesture, none the less. She is pleased to see him and waves to Bill to stay when he offers to make himself scarce. They exchange the usual colleague courtesies of sick visiting, of how the others at work send their love and are appalled at what happened, and how they hope she will be well enough to be back with them in no time. Even Mike Moss asks to be remembered to her.

Jonathon indicates that the press are covering the accident very responsibly, not least of course the TV Company itself. The accident, he risks a laugh, is having the good effect of bringing even better publicity than they were already getting for the forthcoming current affairs programme. A programme on drugs will go ahead as soon as she is able to front it. Is there anything, he is serious now, that the firm can do?

She shakes her head and smiles. Susan is afraid that her relief is evident when her boss says he had better be going – the children are waiting for their grandfather to take them swimming. Jonathon asks Bill for a word outside. Bill reports back a few moments later.

“The Company would like me to front an interview for this evening’s late night news. What do you think? Should I do it? ‘Susan Blakely’s fiancée – devastated for her, and for her friend Linda, of course. Appealing for the person to come forward.’ – that sort of thing. Jonathon’s had a word with the police. It would be good for PR. It would be good,” he says, looking straight at Susan, “For your reputation.”

Susan understands completely, and agrees. She has confidence in Jonathon. And her fiancée appealing for witnesses should enhance her respectable image.

Somewhere in the mid afternoon, Susan is allowed along to see Linda for the first time. She is well enough to walk unaided but the policewoman and the nurse insist on accompanying her, leaving her at the door to Linda’s room. She finds Ken, Kenny and Angela sitting around the bed and Linda sitting up looking remarkably well despite the bed cage that somehow dominates the scene. The family look very close. Ken has Angela on his lap and Kenny, admittedly awkward when Susan arrives, has been holding his mother’s hand.

She almost cries with the relief of seeing Linda looking so well and with the emotion of greeting her. But Linda is composed and knows without anything being said that Susan is the one carrying the guilt. All she says to her friend as they hug is a whispered, “this is not your fault”. As she speaks, Linda strokes Susan’s face gently as if willing it better.

Susan stays with the family for about a half an hour, a long time to be round a hospital bed, but she plays her part in reassuring the children that Linda is well on the way to recovery. Linda, again obviously for the children’s sake, protests how much better she feels today. She hopes to be moved home with nursing care as quickly as possible. If Ken can’t organize it, who can?

She laughs but Ken does not return her smile and just says,

“We need to get you home as soon as possible.”

Susan sees Linda give Ken a long look.

She stays a little while longer, leaving when Tina arrives to see Linda and to take the children back to the Pilar house to cook for them. Susan and Linda can talk later when they are alone. For now, Susan is just glad that Linda does not appear to blame her.

She walks stiffly back down the corridor, vaguely disturbed by what she has seen in the cold look from Linda to Ken but not dwelling on it. She decides to stop off at the hospital canteen and to have a coffee, feeling like an escapee from nurses and policewomen as she does so. The smell of food makes her hungry for the first time since she hit that shop door and, glad that she brought her purse with her from her room, she buys her favourite childhood comfort food – a bacon sandwich.

As she approaches her own room once more, the policewoman is not sitting outside. She is probably off looking for her errant patient. A thankless task, Susan thinks to herself, feeling no guilt at all. The door is ajar, though, and she comes to the doorway to see the tall, dark and distinguished form of Alberto sitting by her bed. She is momentarily panicked at the sight of him and her first thought is to dispatch him before Bill appears. He rises and kisses Susan on each cheek. She does not return the kisses but she does not stop them. The man smiles gently, and with obvious affection. His fury when she left him after their last meeting in the hotel bedroom is obviously gone. He turns to assist her into bed and is about to say something when he almost walks into Bill. Susan has no energy to do anything other than watch and wait.

“Who are you?” Bill asks abruptly, his usual courtesy forgotten. Alberto just looks at him, taking Bill’s measure and deciding how to respond. Alberto is assertive, certainly not aggressive, and certainly not intimidated as he replies,

“I am a friend of Miss Blakely,” he says with a pronounced accent that Susan knows will immediately identify him as Italian.

Bill turns to look at Susan who is feeling caught off-guard.

“This is Alberto. Alberto, Bill.”

Alberto stands and nods in Bill’s direction, clearly deciding whether to say something. Then he turns to Susan with,

“I shall see you again. Be better, very soon.”

He gives a smile to Susan, and the slightest of bows to Bill. A bouquet of mixed flowers stands in a water bag on the cabinet. The bouquet far outmatches the flowers from Bill. Bill just looks at Susan.

“A friend, that’s all, Bill.” Then, as Bill starts to protest, she comes back again, wearily this time, “Not now, Bill. Please.” She sighs and closes her eyes.

“You can’t address issues like this when someone is ill,” she thinks. “Bill has no choice but to let the matter drop.” In any event, Susan reasons, she has many acquaintances and Bill should not assume the worst every time he meets some man in her social circle. He has long since given up trying to follow who all her acquaintances are – she knows so many people in her line of work. This should be no different.

He seems to put it from his mind and he sits with Susan who has little to say but she holds his hand. She enjoys his silent presence and is genuinely sorry when it is time for him to leave for the TV studio. They talk again about the interview he will give and agree that he will confirm that he is her fiancée and deeply concerned that the perpetrator of this act against the two women should be brought to justice as quickly as possible.

“If it was Ramsey, Susan, he is going to have to be dealt with as soon as possible.”

Susan groans at the prospect of the publicity that will now be inevitable. But she has to agree with Bill’s logic. The man will have to be dealt with. This was a serious and life threatening attack. Bill leans towards her.

“Susan, were you honest with me about Ramsey?”

Her eyes are closed and she leaves a long, still silence before she replies.

“I told you before, Bill. I told you the truth.” She makes her voice as icy as she can muster.

“Right,” he lets the matter drop, leaving shortly afterwards to drive his BMW to the television station. He does not seem convinced.

Susan is silently livid. Bill is hardly in a position to take the high moral ground. He deceived her. He engaged Shand. He was hardly honest in his approach to her about that. Can they live in a marriage with the level of dishonesty that exists between them? “I suppose so,” she reflects, as she turns on the television set to catch the interview on the news. “I think so.” At the end of the day, she knows that the greater deceit is hers. As long as she has the upper hand in matters of what is true and what is not, it will be OK.

Susan watches the TV interview. Despite the fact that it is predictable to her professional eye, she is unsettled to see her personal situation and not her public persona portrayed to the world at large.

Rankled, she tries to settle to sleep. But Bill rings her towards nine o’clock. The press have just contacted him, and he thought that Susan should know. It was a Sarah King. She rang from the Journal Daily. Susan groans inwardly. The Journal Daily is a particularly sensationalist national tabloid and a far cry from the local City Tribune. The King woman saw the television appeal for the man responsible to come forward. Was it correct that Bill is Susan Blakely’s partner? Is he going to marry her? Does he know that there is a question mark over Miss Blakely’s private life?

Despite his wrath, Bill was not about to give Sarah King the satisfaction of reacting to her last questions.

“Miss Blakely and I are engaged as the programme said. I have no further comment.”

And, he tells Susan, he has another worry. It dawned on him that he too could now be a suspect. A lover or partner who engages a private detective would have to be considered as having motive to harm. He was on his own on Friday night when the accident happened and cannot prove what his movements were. He wonders whether and when he will hear from the police again.

“Nonsense,” Susan reassures him. “There is nothing for Shand to find out about Ramsey and me. So what motive could you possibly have? The police will see that for themselves. If the police ask anything about why you engaged Shand, you say that we were both worried after his last phone call to me. Say that we should, of course, have gone to the police when Dave Ramsey started to threaten me but we decided that, before we did that, we needed to find out for sure that he posed some sort of threat.”

Bill accepts her advice. She tries to settle to sleep but the noise of the ward keeps her awake. So does the niggling reality that the Journal Daily is on to her. Tonight, Susan has to ask a nurse for something to help her to sleep.

CHAPTER 24

Flashback is one of the hardest things to deal with after a near-death experience. Linda is sure that it was indeed just that – a near-death experience. She could have died on Friday night. Day and night, she recalls pushing Susan and the impact of the car, and then a cold terror stops her in whatever she is doing or wakes her from sleep. She cannot control these flashbacks and the only thing is to wait till the fear subsides. Her personal nurse told her that she could expect the flashbacks to continue but to lessen over time.

Flashback is one thing; recall is another. She remembers the crash quite clearly. Susan screamed as Linda pushed her out of the way. Even in the split second after she saw the headlights coming towards her and until the impact, Linda knew that she was going to be struck. The moment of waiting for the inevitable will stay with her forever. The impact itself was a pain she will never forget and she remembers falling to the ground. She must have passed out then and she came to, she now assumes, a few moments later. She knew that her leg was broken – nothing else could hurt that much. She was on the pavement and Susan was at her side, very still. Two people were kneeling over them and one of them was wrapping a scarf around one of her legs. There seemed to be blood everywhere. She remembered wondering if it was her own.

“The ambulance is coming,” she heard a man’s voice say.

“Susan. How is Susan? How’s my friend?”

“She is comfortable. Lie still now.”

She registered that Susan had been put into the recovery position. The ambulance siren heralded its arrival. Men and women in uniforms, police amongst them, surrounded her. She had a sense of a crowd gathering. She was given an injection and heard someone telling her the pain would begin to ease. It did in just a few minutes. Moments later she was lifted into the ambulance.

She lost sight of Susan.

It seemed almost immediately that a doctor asked her if she felt up to answering a few questions. In reality, she has no idea how long it was before she was on the ward. A policewoman came in with a man who introduced himself as Inspector Philips. She told him what she did remember. No, she had not seen the car against the headlights nor who was driving it.

“It was an accident, wasn’t it?” she said. “Was someone drunk or something?”

“We don’t think it was an accident, Mrs Pilar,” the Inspector said. “There was a witness who seems to think that the car drove towards you both deliberately. It was probably sitting with its engine running and its sidelights on and it moved when you appeared out of the restaurant.”

“But why?” was all she could think of to say.

“We don’t know yet. Do you know of anyone who might want to harm you?”

“No. No, I really don’t.” Her answer was genuine.

The Inspector pushed her gently and learned something of her family and professional life.

Then he asked her about Susan – did she have enemies? She knew that the Inspector saw her hesitate and she covered this with the fact that Susan was very much in the public eye. It was entirely possible that she did have enemies.

The Inspector asked about Dave Ramsey – the police knew that Susan had some trouble with him earlier in the year. Linda stuck to the script that she had agreed with Susan on the night she went round to Susan’s flat in the middle of the night.

After the policeman left, she drifted off to sleep again. When she woke befuddled and then suddenly alert, Jane was by her side.

“Jane,” Linda whispered. “You came. How did you know?”

“Of course. I love you.”

Linda had no energy but she felt Jane take her hand and she tightened her fingers around the younger woman’s hand.

“My leg,” was all she could think of to say.

Jane nodded. “I know. The nurse told me. I thought it might be a lot worse when I heard the news. It was on the radio this morning. That’s why I came. They didn’t say how bad you both were. I had to come, Linda, even if Ken is here. I know that I shouldn’t have.” She looked around as she said this.

“He’s gone to get the children,” Linda reassured her. “He’ll be a little while. I’m glad you are here.” Linda could not help it – she felt herself drifting off to sleep, her hand still in Jane’s.

From somewhere far away, she heard Ken’s voice, snarling almost, and the words, “What are you doing here?” Then she heard the Inspector’s voice and Ken saying that this was the American woman he told the police about. She struggled to regain consciousness and saw Jane being taken out by the policeman and the police sergeant. They seemed to lead her to a room down the corridor. As she drifted off, the door shut behind Jane and the police officers.

When she woke again, it was afternoon and Ken and the children were coming into the room. Whatever drugs she had been given had worn off and she felt remarkably clear headed, as if waking from a haze of recent memories. She was incredibly relieved to see the two children. They were distressed but reassured to be with her. She was going to be fine and would be home just as soon as Ken could organise some help for her at home. Tina’s presence, a wheelchair and a home care worker to look after Linda’s personal care were all that would be required on a day-to-day basis. With a community nurse to dress the wound, she would have all she needed.

It was easy to give her love and reassurance to Susan when she came into the room, looking as if she had just done ten rounds in the ring with a heavyweight champion. She knew that Susan would blame herself for all this, if it did turn out to be Ramsey who had driven at them. That was by no means certain yet and no matter what, Susan was not to blame.

Later, she thought about Ken. Jane would not have as easy access to their house as to a hospital ward. That was why he wanted her home. It confirmed in her mind that her marriage would now only be an outer semblance of their previous relationship. She lay in bed, angry at his controlling her in this way and angry too, that she was now in a bigger trap than ever by virtue of her injuries. Added to that was the fact that it could be weeks before she would resume any sort of ordinary work at the University.

Seeing Jane was so good. How did she pluck up the courage to just walk in past Ken and the policewoman to see her? Linda knew now, not that she needed any reminder, just where her emotional connection lay – it was with Jane. A nurse reassured her. Jane was released.

Ken behaved like a possessive angry brute when he saw Jane at the hospital. And he must have suggested to the police that Jane would have motive to attack Linda – presumably as a jilted lover. How dare he? That was unforgivable. Surely he could not believe that of Jane and he was simply being vengeful? She would not forget this day. She would not forgive this day either. He must assume now that he has won and that he forced Linda to send Jane packing. He was obviously very angry when he saw Jane. Later, as soon as the children were out of earshot and off to buy some drinks for themselves, he demanded to know what ‘that woman’ thought she was doing. Linda was tired, and sarcastic.

“What do you think? Seeing if I’m all right.”

She closed her eyes and left him to exit from the room. If I weren’t ill, she thought, he would probably have slammed the door.

What is really clear to her as she lies on the hospital bed is the fundamental change in the relationship between her and Ken. The vignette where he said “We have to get you home quickly” comes to her again and again and it epitomises the change for her. Just six months ago, they were equal partners, pulling together despite their diverse life interests. And their shared direction was the children. Now everything except the joint concern for the children has changed. The relationship is based on power exerted and control established, by Ken. It is no longer equal.

She is the one who triggered the change. She has no one to blame, if that is the word, but herself. Ken may well have been deeply troubled by the accident, but the gulf between them is not going to close. The accident will not change that. They both know it and neither of them is using the time in hospital to change it. Linda concludes that it is too late: if she was the one who sowed the seeds of the end of the marriage, Ken is the one who watered them.

Linda is still not convinced that the car incident was other than a rogue event. She simply cannot believe that anyone would want to hurt her. Jane certainly would not. That was nonsense on Ken’s part and mischievous nonsense at that. It was outrageous that he had Jane questioned by the police. It might just have been Ramsey – that was the only conceivable link to Susan that she could think of. Even then, Dave Ramsey did not strike her as being as aggressive and violent as to attack two women with a car.

She is amused to discover on the Sunday evening that the police also interviewed Ken. Never in a month of Sundays would Ken do anything like that – no matter his wrath at her relationship with Jane. Ken was too strong, too stable and ultimately, too devoted to the children. But the notion that the police must have worked out that he too would have motive to harm Linda – to take revenge over her relationship with Jane – struck her as poetic justice and as cause for wry amusement.

She is so angry that Jane has been questioned. They simply do not know her gentleness. Nor would they know from Jane, or from herself, about their relationship. Ken will have told them – he will have told the police about his wife’s admirer. Ken refused though, to tell her what he said to the police and she only asked once. One thing she is all but certain of – she was not the target of the car attack.

Many times as she lies in bed, her thoughts turn to Angela and Kenny. They have obviously been very traumatised by the accident – there is no other way to describe the looks on their faces when they came to see her on Saturday afternoon. Angela could not help crying when she saw the bed cage and all the paraphernalia of tubes and machines around the bed. Even Kenny looked shocked and for once did not hesitate to come to his mother for a hug. It took all her level headedness not to cry herself when she saw them. She found it in herself to crack jokes about what it was going to be like having a broken leg in the family. They would be one leg short for a while. Making as light as possible of the accident and its aftermath calmed the two youngsters.

Lying in the hospital bed, she knows that the children’s reactions confirmed for her that, hard as it is going to be, she made the right decision to stay with them. Any weakening of her resolve is gone. There is no circumstance in which she will allow the children to be further upset than they are over this. They need both parents. They will have both parents.

Her young lover does not come back to the hospital and Linda senses that she will not. She is tempted to ring her just to hear her voice and to speak with her. She decides this would not be fair to Jane. She does come to a decision though, somewhere in the early hours of Sunday morning. She is not going to lose all personal contact with Jane. If Jane will see her, she will see Jane. She will do it without Ken knowing – at this stage anyway. Lying here, it seems both sensible and pragmatic in all the circumstances. But she will wait for a while until the business of the car attack is out of the way and she is mobile again. It does not seem like a decision, really. It just seems inevitable.

Susan comes to see her from her ward for the second time, early on the Monday morning. They are alone together for the first time since they were injured. All she says is “I’m so sorry, Linda.”

Linda’s words to Susan are calm and reassuring but Linda knows that somewhere inside herself she does now hold an element of blame for Susan. She would never say so nor would she act on it. If Susan had not messed with Ramsey, this would not have happened. If it was Ramsey, that is. “You can’t just be a fair weather friend”, are her private thoughts as she chides herself for her lack of charity.

“Do you remember what happened?” Susan asks her. She has almost a plea in her eyes.

“Yes. Do you?”

“No. Not really. They’ve told me most of it. But, no, it’s pretty vague. What did happen? What do you remember?”

Linda tells her all that she can remember herself. There is no point in not doing so. Susan listens as if desperate for information. They exchange details about the police questions. They talk about their respective injuries. But Susan is tired. She has been vomiting the previous day and Linda’s nurse advises her back to her own ward.

Neither of them speculates much to the other about who attacked them or why – Linda suspects that Susan could not face yet that it might have been Dave Ramsey. Yet he looks the obvious suspect to her, if it was indeed a personal attack. She knows within herself that this is where her feeling of blame comes from.

By Monday morning Linda is restless to be discharged and persuades the doctors that she can be cared for at home. She watches as what seems like an inordinate amount of effort goes in to organising a wheelchair, a home care worker and a community nurse. She never ceases to wonder at the compartmentalisation of bureaucracy. Finally, everything is confirmed and her doctor clears her for discharge on Tuesday morning.

On Monday afternoon, the Principal of the University comes to see her on the ward. A man in his early fifties, Robert Thane is both an academic and, by virtue of the post he holds, an experienced businessman. He is dynamic and shrewd and not the stereotypical image at all of an ivory tower academic. Linda and he have always got on very well in the world of the University.

There is therefore, a great deal of mutual respect between them as he comes in, kisses her on the cheek and is solicitous about her well-being. He says all the right things about the horrific experience she has had and she makes as light of her injuries as sense allows. They are soon down to the business of keeping her School at the University operational and looking at the general implications for the year that is just about to commence. Linda is able to demonstrate by what she says and by what Thane already knows of her that she is the strong confident type for whom there will be little psychological scarring. Certainly, nothing will interfere with her capacity for work. He says that he knows her well enough to have expected her to say this and takes some time to reassure her that she should get back to work when she is truly fit and not before.

Once that is said, they are both able to get on with the practicalities of getting her operational as quickly as possible. She laughingly points out that only her leg and her bruised rib cage are damaged, and not her brain. She has her office at home, of course, and is fully connected to the University by computer. The departmental secretary will liase routinely with her in terms of keeping the administration going and other staff can absorb her teaching programme for a week or two. They can always videoconference anything that requires that level of interaction, whether a lecture or a meeting. In any event, she is only thinking of being at home for the shortest time until she arranges transport and access to allow her to get back to work. She hopes to be mobile within ten days or so.

As Robert is about to leave, he hesitates at the door and repeats that he is glad to see her looking so well in all the circumstances. There is one other thing that happened that he feels she ought to be aware of. She looks at him.

“There has been an enquiry from the press about your personal life. We dispatched the journalist of course, someone from the Journal Daily. It was a woman called Sarah King, I recall. It’s outrageous nonsense of course, Linda. These tabloids are disgraceful, the way they jump at any misfortune and look to boost their sales. I don’t think it will come to anything, Linda – they are probably trying to capitalise on the publicity of two such high-powered women as Miss Blakely and yourself being attacked. Anything that makes one paper’s story different from another’s puts them ahead.”

She waits. He seems to leave it at that and to change the subject.

“Your colleagues have all been in touch and are passing on their good wishes. There is a lot of shock in the University about what has happened.”

Linda knows that something else is coming. Thane takes a step back into the room.

“You have built up an extremely sound academic team in the last few years. They are a very loyal group with impressive publications. And it is heartening to see international dimensions to your appointments these days. That young Doctor Gray, for example. She should go far. I imagine she will have a very successful career ahead of her, having worked here. That would be true for many of your other colleagues, of course.”

So that’s it. Jane Gray has been named by the press, Robert is not going to allude to it but is hinting that it might be better all round if Jane progressed her career elsewhere. The University will not do anything; Linda should see to it.

Linda just smiles at the literal content of Robert’s message and appears to ignore the implicit meaning.

Robert Thane heads once again for the room door with,

“Now you rest, my Dear Linda, and come back to us as soon as you feel able.”

It is the classic door-handle communication. The critical message is left till the last moment and it is designed to be conveyed in such a way that there can be no discussion. Robert has done it cleverly – the story of Linda and Jane is out but it is no business of the University to ask questions. Nor do they seem to want answers to the questions. No, irrespective of the truth of the matter, the University is backing Linda, protecting her and its own interests, and suggesting – no more than that – that a move for Jane would be politic. There is nothing they could or would do in any formal sense, as things stand.

Will she act as she has been advised to? Should she put career – hers – before her attraction for Jane? For a few seconds, she is tempted. It was a fling; that is all – a silly, dangerous fling. But no, she decides, in the minute after Robert’s departure, she will not. Jane is not an idle fancy on her part. It may threaten her future in every direction, but Jane is too important to give up. Her heart may be in the ascendancy over her head, and maybe she will live to regret it, but she will not push Jane out of her post at the University. She will do what Robert Thane probably now surmises – nothing.

It will be a long wait to see whether the tabloid prints a story. She knows that any expose will be pretty ghastly. Tabloids like the lurid aspects of people’s lives and what is not lurid, they make lurid. Her main concern is for the children and not for herself, or for Jane for that matter. She assumes Jane and she are both strong enough, as adults, to ride out any adverse publicity and they will both be able to survive somehow, in terms of employment. At least, she hopes so. She does not relish the prospect and the thought of being despised for what she feels is abhorrent; frightening even. But in reality, the children are the vulnerable ones. What would they read and how would they feel? How would their school chums react? What would she say to them? What would Ken say to them?

She decides against forewarning Ken and the children. The family do not have tabloid papers in the house and she can get to the children as soon as anything is printed. To say anything to Ken at this stage would be to give him the satisfaction of being self-righteous. It would fuel his wrath. If press exposure happens, it happens. She is not ashamed of Jane - quite the contrary. But she knows that anything that the press write will be chalk and cheese different from their relationship. If it happens, she will just have to talk to the children openly about what her feelings for Jane really are.

She wonders whether she should try to alert Jane but knows that it will be too late already. If the paper has been to the University, they have undoubtedly been to Jane first. She assumes that the only person they have not been to is Linda herself, possibly because the police have cordoned her off within the hospital from any publicity. She suspects though, that it will now only be a matter of time.

She will have to decide what to say if she was accosted – and that is the word for what she imagines will happen. Should she deny the relationship, or admit it? Or give a ‘no comment’ brush off? The last option certainly seems the attractive, if not the only possible, route. How can she deny what is true? Or admit the truth and be exposed to ridicule and who knows what else? The children have to be protected from that.

She wonders again about the employment issue. Jane needs to be protected professionally. Maybe she does too. She knows there is now protection in employment legislation for people in same sex relationships. But victimisation is an insidious process, often out of synch with the words in law and regulations. And personal relationships in the workplace, certainly in the university, are still frowned on. These two issues together put both women in a dangerous situation. The University would react to protect its interests; she knows enough of the politics of this to believe that. She has been involved in the self same politics often enough herself, looking out for the reputation of the institution. It would come down to damage limitation at the University. If damage limitation meant that the University would say or do nothing about Jane and her, they are safe. But if the University has to take any action to protect its interests as a corporate entity, there could be problems.

Something from her work with the University Press Relations Officer comes back to her now. It is that the ‘no comment’ route is not helpful. It infers guilt and gives the press the opportunity to put their particular spin on whatever the issue is. They can put any number of constructions on those two words. She faces a trap. She has not the first idea, she realizes, as to how to react if this Sarah King woman contacts her.

Thanks to newspaper deliveries in hospitals organised by the voluntary sector, she is able to monitor the papers on Monday evening and Tuesday morning. There is nothing in them to worry her – only a very full coverage of the two high profile women being the victims of a vicious car hit and run. Susan attracts more coverage, of course, but Linda is also named in all the papers and in the broadsheets, and her academic career is covered in some detail. In other circumstances, it would have been welcome and gratifying publicity. Now she just wonders if this Sarah King will use Linda’s heightened profile to further her own ends of exposing Jane and herself.

By the time she is watching the Monday evening TV news the subject has been covered as a crime from every angle, but there is no new news. The police are still asking for witnesses to come forward.

After what seems like a lifetime, Linda leaves hospital on Tuesday morning. Ken comes to the hospital in the mid-morning, his morning surgery over, and he assists as her nurse pushes her in a wheelchair to a waiting ambulance. He is at the house ahead of her and Tina has the front door open as the ambulance drives down the drive. She is taken up to her room on a stretcher where a number of aids and adaptations give the bedroom a clinical atmosphere. Flowers and cards soften the impression. A pull above the bed allows her to haul herself up in her bed and a bell has been installed so that she can call for Tina and the family. Struggling with mobility inside her plaster cast and with the pain of the wound, Linda realizes that her recovery is not going to be as easy as she thought when she was in the relative security of the hospital bed. She is home though, and that is an enormous relief.

A district nurse calls - she is from the same health centre as Ken so there is a friendliness and a social atmosphere as they all move through settling her in and making all the health and practical decisions needed. A home care worker will come in each morning and evening to help her to wash, dress and undress. Otherwise, save for the nurse calling regularly to see to her wound, she and Tina will be alone in the days ahead and the family and Tina will be together in the evenings.

By Tuesday afternoon she is tired and glad to doze in bed until the children, collected by Tina in the family estate car, return home from school. An air of excitement fills the bedroom as the children arrive. Angela carries the bunch of flowers for her that they purchased on the way home. There follows an hour of excited chat as they tell Linda about their day at school and what their various friends said to them about Linda being on the TV news.

Tina persuades them downstairs to eat supper just before the evening news. Linda can watch it in peace. The regional news comes on at six fifteen and Susan and she are the lead item. It starts with a shot of the street where the attack happened and a photo of Susan follows. The newsreader’s voiceover breaks the news.

“Police are interviewing a thirty six year old man in connection with Friday night’s hit and run attack on TV presenter Susan Blakely and her friend Professor Linda Pilar. It is not yet certain who the man is but he is believed to be David Ramsey, a minister who worked until recently at the city Cathedral and at the church mission’s centre for the homeless, also here in the city. The Reverend Ramsey – seen here being interviewed on Mull – was the minister who led the church response several years ago, when a serious boating accident off Mull cost the lives of two young people. It is believed that the Reverend Ramsey walked into the police station himself earlier today and this would indicate that he has confessed to the attack. A man is expected to appear in court tomorrow.”

A section of Dave Ramsey’s interview on Mull is shown but Susan’s presence as interviewer is not drawn out – yet. Linda thinks that that will be next.

So, she concludes, it was a deliberate car attack by the looks of it. And it also looks as if her first, only tenuous, suspicion is confirmed. It was Ramsey. Anger grips her. How could someone do this to her deliberately when she was not involved? And how could Ramsey attack Susan when he cared for her at some point? He has to be one sick bastard – she can hardly contain her loathing for him as she sits in bed, legs still encased in a bed tent. She hopes that the courts throw the book at him.

The phone rings within a few minutes. Predictably, it is Susan, ringing from the hospital. Clearheaded now, Susan has one question,

“Have you seen the news?”

“Yes, I have. How are you feeling, Susan?”

“Dreadful, Linda. I am so sorry. This is my entire fault. If I hadn’t got tangled up with him – or if I’d dealt with it differently – this wouldn’t have happened. This attack was meant for me and you are the one with the serious injuries.”

“Susan, we both got hurt. It is simply not your fault. I mean it, Susan. Dave Ramsey must be insane. He did this and no one else. He is responsible.” She says the words; wishes she truly meant them.

It is a stressful call but both women are at least relieved that the person has been found. And Susan tells Linda that she knows for definite that it was Ramsey who was interviewed – the police advised her just before the news went out. The fantasy fear of some stranger waiting to pounce again is gone. Linda cannot stop worrying, though, about the children’s safety. And although she did not really believe that she was the target, Linda is relieved to have it confirmed.

The children arrive back into Linda’s bedroom during the call and she changes the conversation, asking about Susan’s recovery. Susan is still being monitored, as they are worried about her vomiting and has not yet been given a discharge date. Susan will be watching the papers in the morning, she says, to see what they say about Ramsey and how much has leaked about the minister and her. Linda agrees to speak to her in the morning and puts the phone down, knowing, in fact, that both women have cause to watch the papers. She has not troubled Susan with her fears about Sarah King and the possible exposure of Jane and herself. Susan has enough to worry about overnight. But she was tempted to say something, even if she does know it is the inner child in her is wanting to say “now see what you have done” to Susan.

She sleeps fitfully from about nine o’clock onwards. Ken vacated the bed until, he said by way of excuse, she was more comfortable. She did not object, even if the old adage about never vacating the marital bed did flit through her mind. The phone rings, waking her from sleep, somewhere around ten. It is Sarah King, the voice says from the Journal Daily. Will Professor Pilar confirm that she and Jane Gray are lovers? Linda takes the option she has not considered before. It is an instinctive reaction, born of anger and fear. She puts the receiver down and blocks the phone to incoming calls.

She lies awake for hours after this with the sense of dread that helplessness brings. There is nothing she can do. Should she have seen a solicitor earlier in the day when Robert Thane alerted her? She remembers something her Press Relations colleague said – ‘you can’t fight the press and win’. This is like being the proverbial rabbit caught in headlight glare.

She sleeps somewhere towards three o’clock – she cannot be sure. Flashbacks from the accident wake her twice and her last dream is of a bus driving at speed towards her and Jane. Robert Thane is at the wheel.

CHAPTER 25

‘VICARAGE SEX ROMP ENDS IN ROAD RAGE ATTACK’. So pronounces the headline on the Journal Daily on Thursday morning. A photo of Susan, taken at a conference about six months ago for a journalists’ library bank, is beneath the strap line. Beside it is a photo of Dave Ramsey, trying unsuccessfully to conceal his face, as he is escorted from the police station.

The subheading reads ‘TV Presenter has Affair with Minister’. The article continues: ‘Journal Daily can now exclusively reveal that the man being held in connection with the attempted murder of TV presenter Susan Blakely on Friday last is in fact her jilted lover.

Thirty six year old Dave Ramsey is being questioned about the hit and run attack on Susan Blakely and her friend Professor Linda Pilar. He is said to have catapulted his car at them outside the city’s One-To-One restaurant as the two women were leaving the trendy eating-house.

A reliable source has revealed that the reason for the attack was the Reverend Ramsey’s fury at being jilted by Miss Blakely after she had an affair with him on the island of Mull. The couple met when Blakely interviewed Ramsey after a drowning accident off the island’s east coast. Reverend Ramsey was praised at the time for his handling of the church response.

Susan Blakely, well known for her withering attacks on people who transgress in public life, appears to have now done the same thing herself. She is currently engaged to legal expert Bill Nicolson, of Nicolson and Berry. He was not available for comment last night.

Journal Daily can reveal that the affair took place over a period of years and that Ramsey’s unsuspecting wife, Brenda, was left alone at home for many evenings at a time.

A source close to Mrs Ramsey stated that the nature of the sexual relationship between Brenda’s husband and Miss Blakely was lurid and kinky.

A deeply distressed and tearful Mrs Ramsey said yesterday that divorce is now inevitable.’

Jonathon brings the paper round to her flat on Thursday morning towards nine o’clock. She has been home from hospital for nearly twenty-four hours and Jonathon knows she does not have tabloids delivered. He comes in to the flat more like a friend than a boss and sits quietly whilst she reads the leader article. She says nothing, just looks at him and asks,

“What now?” She means, “How is the TV Company going to react? And how did the Journal Daily get this? I thought the City Tribune got it from Ramsey?”

Jonathon has been with the chief executive, Martin Braithwaite, and came straight over from his office to Susan’s flat. Jonathon is acting as a go-between. He is a man of few words.

“Damage limitation, Susan. That’s all we can do. We have had several papers on to us this morning looking for comment. We’ve given the same response to them all. ‘Susan Blakely is one of our best TV presenters, she has had an appalling experience in the recent car attack on her and we have every confidence in her. We will not comment any further on a matter that is in the hands of the police.’ That will be all we will say.”

Susan gets the impression from the steel in her boss’s voice that he has had a rough ride with Braithwaite.

“Does the Chief want to see me?”

“No. Not at the moment, anyway. His view is that you obviously won’t be fit enough to do the programme for a week or two and that we should let one of the team front next week till this blows over. Then we should stay clear of any topics that could be linked to this sort of stuff.” He waves a hand at the paper that lies on the table between them.

“The Ramsey case won’t come to court till after the series is over so we will get some breathing space till then. There is not much they can print in the meantime.”

He is watching her closely, now.

“Is there much to come out, Susan?”

She has no choice. A lie now could cost her later.

“Possibly.”

“I see. Well, all we can do is wait. Susan, there is every chance you can ride this out. Your reputation has gone from strength to strength over the last few years, especially over this summer in particular. The viewing figures for ‘Live Tonight’ are high and the crits are good. There is also enormous sympathy for both of you – you and Linda – over this accident.”

“Opinion is fickle, though. We know that, Jonathon. I need to get back in the public eye as soon as possible”

“Oh, sure. And the positive stuff about you far outweighs the tabloid. The TV Company has much greater influence than this tabloid muck-spreader. You know that.”

“Do you think I should seek a legal opinion about an action against the paper?” She knows the answer before she finishes the question.

“Absolutely not. That will just attract more attention. No. Say nothing. Do nothing. Come back to work as soon as you are ready and we take it from there.”

“Right. Thanks, Jonathon.”

He indicates that there is nothing to thank him for. But Susan knows him and the Company. She surmises that there will have been a top-level meeting about her and in her absence. Jonathon will have been summoned. They will have discussed the options; throw her to the wolves and protect the TV Company; or protect her in order to protect the company. She knows that Jonathon will have argued for the latter – he always has a soft spot for his own staff, her included. She does owe him her thanks, even if he will not accept them.

She tries to gauge the political climate of the meeting that Jonathon was in.

“Was it a difficult meeting with the Chief, Jonathon?” He clearly knows exactly what she means.

“No. Not really, Susan. Everyone is very sympathetic.” She hopes this is true.

He does not stay long. He needs to be fielding from his desk. She knows not to bother to offer him coffee.

The flat is big, silent and empty when he goes, the Journal Daily lying like a cancerous growth in the body of her living space. She reads the article again, looking between the lines for the informant. It looks very much as if it must have been Brenda who gave them the information. Maybe she took the initiative and went to them, rather than them going to her.

She feels miserable. Hospitals breed infection and she is nursing a head cold that she picked up in the last couple of days. Her eyes smart and her nose is running. The symptoms of the concussion have abated, though, and all the weakness and sickness has long since passed. Despite Linda’s account, she still has no recall from the moment of impact onwards until the next day in the hospital bed.

She wanted to be discharged from hospital sooner but she had a cautious doctor. She had a full battery of tests and she was finally given the all clear. There is no internal bleeding and no lasting damage. It was, the doctor thought, a mild and uncomplicated concussion but with the combination of emotional trauma from the attack, the need for police protection and her high profile job, he persuaded her to rest in the hospital until Wednesday.

The early days after the accident are a blur now. She remembers being told what had happened by a doctor when she came round. Bill told her again. She remembers Bill being around at the beginning. But he has not been back since Alberto came to the hospital. Perhaps his nose is out of joint?

She remembers Alberto’s visit and his calm, gentle concern for her. He behaved like a perfect gentleman and there was something endearing about him.

Her biggest sadness is for Linda; Linda with her broken leg, her broken marriage, her broken relationship. Susan is responsible for Linda being there when that madman came at them. How can she ever forgive herself for that?

She remembers the police questions, gentle at first and paced to what the doctors would allow, more pressing as the week went on. Then they came to see her to tell her about Dave Ramsey’s confession.

She thought then that her career could be over, at least in its present form. She simply did not see how she could survive the publicity of Ramsey’s open confession as to what he had done and why. It would all come out in court and she would go down with him, at least in terms of reputation. She spent the last period in the hospital in a deep trough of unhappiness that no amount of visiting well-wishers, cards or flowers could offset. But despite the wary concern of her doctor, she refused any medication, including anything to help her to sleep after her discharge. She let the doctor think it was post-traumatic emotion she was feeling and said she preferred to get over it slowly and without pills. This was not quite true because what you do not remember; you do not feel traumatised by. All she felt about the accident was a sense of frustration that she was dependant on others to tell her about vital minutes of her life. She wondered how people come to terms with longer periods of being in a coma. The world moved on in even the short time she lost, leaving her to make a lot of mental adjustments.

She rang Bill on Wednesday to let him know that she was being discharged but only connected with his answer phone. He did not come round to her flat on the Wednesday evening as she thought he might. Colleagues from work arranged to have a box of food delivered so that she did not need to go out. She rang Linda and talked with her for a while but other than that she just had a quiet time, adjusting to being out of hospital and away from the imposed regime.

Since being told about Ramsey, she has felt herself to be in a trap from which there is no escape. Fleeting moments of surprise, that Ramsey would have had the balls to actually do anything like this, have given way to contempt – sheer and utter contempt. That he attacked her was despicable but that he attacked Linda leaves her with no words to describe her loathing of him.

She assumes that she will now have to be a witness in court when the time comes. She will presumably be asked about her relationship with Ramsey. She will be under oath and it does not take having a lawyer for a partner to know the implication of that. If she were to lie, it would be perjury. If she does not, she is facing public exposure.

Now there is this – the Journal Daily. It is already a set of allegations in the public domain. The Journal Daily might only be a right wing tabloid, but the great British public do not exactly discriminate when it comes to sensational reporting. Whether something is said or just inferred does not matter – the reader takes it as fact. She can only hope that she has a bigger following and a broader reputation than anything that one tabloid can do by way of damage to her.

After Jonathon leaves her flat, Susan contemplates the future. She muses that, were she a man in similar circumstances, the situation would be entirely different. It is just the way of the world for a man to have an affair with a woman, married or not. Married men in higher profile positions than hers – politicians, world leaders, celebrities – survive this sort of thing. She might not. And she might not, precisely because she is a high profile woman. This is also the way of the world.

But Susan Blakely is not one to fall on her sword, she decides. She is going to fight to survive and not only to survive, to win. That is her first decision.

Her mind moves to the other things that matter to her in addition to her career. Her personal freedom is one thing, but does that have to include her sexual freedom? Bill matters. Can all of this be reconciled? If it can, she might at least live some sort of coherent life on her own terms.

Alberto comes to mind. He has not come to see her again but has sent a hand written note to say that he is returning to Italy and would like to see her on his next business trip to the city. He will contact her on his return. She decides that she will not see him, although she admits to herself that she is tempted. She enjoyed the sophistication of his attention and the way he behaved at the hospital. But no, it would become an emotional involvement and, unusual as it is for her to have any feeling for someone after an encounter like that, she could not cope with the complication of both Bill and Alberto at once. Bill is the known quantity – sure, steady, safe and nice. And Linda is right – no marriage could survive the Albertos of life.

She must see Bill. She needs to discuss the Journal Daily article with him. Perhaps it is time to confess the truth about Ramsey to him and to throw herself, as it were, on his mercy. She will suggest that they go on as before, not living together, at least for the time being. Then as she sits here, she concludes that she could be jumping the gun to confess; to tell him even a part of what happened would be to fall in to the classic trap set by the journalist – to admit the allegation before you have to. No, she will see Bill and discuss the article with him, then gauge his reaction. She has not seen him since Ramsey confessed – she would like to pick his brains about the legal proceedings that will follow.

She rings his office. Fiona, his secretary says he is engaged. Can she take a message? Susan says she would like to call round to the office and to go out to lunch with him. Will he be free? Fiona will ring her back. Susan showers and dresses quickly and then waits. Eventually the secretary rings just before one o’clock to say that Mr Nicolson is sorry - he has a lunch engagement. Susan knows now that something is wrong. TV presenters have keen ears for this sort of thing. She does not hesitate. She is in fighting mood. She is fighting for survival.

She drives across the town, arriving into the car park of Nicolson and Berry at a few minutes to two. The offices are quiet but a receptionist whom Susan recognizes is on duty.

“Is Mr Nicolson in, Penny?”

“He is, Miss Blakely. Shall I tell him you are here?” If Penny is shocked at the bruising on Sauan’s face, she shows no sign of it.

“No. Don’t bother, Penny. I’ll surprise him.” She gives the receptionist a smile and a conspiratorial wink and passes by the desk before the young girl has time to argue.

She goes down the corridor to the double oak panelled door that is the entrance to Bill’s office suite. She knocks and enters without waiting for the reply.

Bill is not in conference. He is sitting alone at his desk, the swivel chair facing out of the window and a tray of sandwiches and fresh fruit by his side. He appears to be reading the financial supplement of one of the dailies.

“Hi,” she says, as he turns round and then she stops as she sees the frozen expression on his face.

“What are you doing here?”

“I thought we might have lunch but they said you were busy. Are you busy? If you are we could have supper tonight at your place or mine.” There is a suggestive hint in her voice.

She is not prepared for his reaction.

“Susan. After you leave this office I never want to see you again.”

She slumps into the seat opposite him.

“What? Bill. What’s this about? You were fine – we were fine at the hospital. Is this about that man Alberto? He’s only an acquaintance, Bill. No one to be jealous of.”

“No, Susan. It is not just about Alberto – whoever he is.”

She watches him, deciding whether to say anything else. She fills the silence.

“Have you seen this morning’s Journal Daily?”

“Yes.”

“Is that what this is about, Bill? I told you about that.”

“It’s not even about Ramsey. It’s about you. You and Ramsey. You and Paccini.”

How does he know Alberto’s surname? She would barely have remembered it herself.

“But more than anything, Susan it’s about lies and deceit. I won’t have that.”

“How do you know Alberto’s surname?”

“That really does not matter. I made it my business to find it. You have been all but prostituting yourself and taking me for a fool into the bargain.”

Attack is her best form of defence. It also heralds the end.

“Have you been spying on me, Bill? Have you? You have. You have, you bastard.” She wells with anger and starts to make for the door and then checks herself. If she goes through that door there may be no route back. Is there still time to seek mercy?

“All right, Bill. I can explain, you know. This has nothing to do with how I feel about you. I need you, Bill. You are very important to me. I want us to marry.”

He just looks at her.

“But do you love me, Susan?”

She cannot reply. He fills the silence for her.

“I loved you, Susan. But I don’t now. Not any more.”

He waits, and then speaks as coldly as she has ever heard him.

“Shand found out the truth, Susan. I was not spying on you, as you put it. But Shand came to see me at the flat on the same evening that Sarah King rang me. He told me that he followed you to the hotel where you had dinner with Paccini that night, whilst I was still in Italy. He saw you enter and leave his room. He was on to you, was Shand, while I was still being taken in. You are a whore, Susan. There is no other way to see it. Please go. I have work to do.”

He swings his chair away from her. She knows there is no point in arguing. She is defeated and humiliated. She leaves, walking away from his chair, which is still swivelled away towards the window.

CHAPTER 26

She drives into the country, finds a headland by the sea and sits there alone, looking at the grey waves rolling on to the beach. The scene of the sea, whipped by an autumn gale, fits her mood. And against the backdrop of the sea, she feels small, very small indeed. If there is a nadir to Susan Blakely’s life, it is now. The one person who loved her has just dispatched her into her own emotional wasteland. Bill attracted her once – he was nice, kind and solid – and she enjoyed the early days of the relationship. She really thought that she was genuinely in love. But, she supposes, people are blind to themselves when they are in that emotional state. She does not have what it takes to be monogamous – not even to be monogamous for a stretch of time. She has to have other outlets to satisfy the sexual and emotional drives in her.

Behind the depression of this afternoon comes the anger that has to bubble out. It bubbles out slowly as she begins to feel the unfairness of a society – of men – who demand monogamy. Why in God’s name, is it so damned important at the end of the day? She was – has been – genuinely fond of Bill; yes, in her own way she loved him. She could have seen life going on much as it was, indefinitely. What she does with the ‘Mr Anybodys’ of the world is different. It simply does not impinge, as far as she is concerned, on her feelings for Bill and the time she spends with him.

She knows that it is over as far as she and Bill are concerned. He was so cold and unreachable in his office, so impervious to her presence. It was a different Bill who told her to leave from the one whom she knew till that moment. It was impossible for her to reach out to him. She guesses that that will not change now. What there was is gone. It is over. Bill did not hate her. He was indifferent and that, she knows is the opposite of love. Ironically, this is not what she wants.

In these minutes, her anger for Bill comes to the fore. It is anger for a man who does not have the vision to see beyond the conventional world of conventional relationships. They could have had such a good, free life if he had given her the opportunity to be in an open relationship with him. Her feelings swing round. If it can be over for him, she can make it over for her.

And he must have spied on her – that was unforgivable. How else could he have known Alberto’s surname? At the end of the day, Bill engaged Shand. Maybe it was a double standard on her part, but she told Bill that she was faithful to him. He should have believed her.

She faces the loss of Bill painfully enough, sitting there as a band of rain comes in from the sea and lashes the windscreen. It is even harder to face the solitude that goes with this loss. There will be no late night or early morning telephone calls, no regular sleepovers, or lunches, no appointments in the diary to give a structure to the future. There will be nothing to resist and push against in someone else’s attentions. There is no one who genuinely cares. It is one thing to resist someone - quite another to have no one to resist.

She is alone - utterly alone. And she is disgraced in the public eye. This is to be her future. She knows it. Sitting in her car, she cries, the tears those of pure despair. As her tears turn to sobs, her child takes over and Susan wants to see her dead parents. She cries out, and utters only one word – “Dad”.

The rain moves away inland and the sea begins to calm as the tide drops. Sometime later, Susan sits more quietly as if in her own calm after her own storm. Susan Blakely has finally looked at herself and knows just who she is and who she will continue to be. Recognition has preceded resolution. She comes out of the afternoon, not broken, not saddened but quieter and stronger. In her own way, she has survived. She has adjusted. She has accepted who she is. She turns her loss of aspirations for her life to acceptance – cold, cold acceptance. Her smattering of school day French comes back to her - ‘je suis ce que je suis’.

To outward appearances, her life will not look that different. She will not be seeing Bill, of course, but it has been only two years after all, since that friendship started. She will continue with the TV series until the end of the contract. In the meantime, she has some thinking to do about what she wants career-wise after that. She will use the winter to decide on her options. Alberto will ring. She will see him. Why not? If this is to be her life, the life of a single, career driven woman, she will take it as it comes and on her own terms. She will enjoy her freedom and use it exactly as she chooses.

She is not happy but then, she is not unhappy either. As she adjusts her make-up and turns the ignition to drive back to the city, she thinks, “I just am what I am; that’s all”.

As she draws away from the quiet seaside road and heads to the city by-pass, she decides that she does not want to spend the evening alone. She is feeling OK and does not want to dwell any further on her thoughts of the afternoon.

She pulls the car over, lifts her mobile and rings Linda. Can she come round in an hour or so and spend some of the evening there? Linda is eager to see her, Susan can tell that, and very serious. No, Susan declines, she will not have supper with the family. She will see Linda soon.

She chooses a roadside pub, a multiple with a reasonable reputation for British food and sits over a glass of wine and the menu to give time for her face to lose its slight puffiness. It will also give the Pilar family time to eat. She does not expect it to be exactly a jolly occasion between Linda and Ken and the later she leaves it, the more chance there will be that Ken will be downstairs with the children and that she can talk alone by Linda’s bedside.

She heads over to the bar and orders the fish of the day with boiled potatoes and salad. While she waits for her meal, she scans the headlines of the City Tribune. There has been a multiple car pile up with one fatality in the early morning fog; a campaign is being mounted to stop the runway extension at the airport and parents associations at several schools are amalgamating to lobby for the education authority to insist that homosexual teachers should declare their orientation at any interviews for employment - the city, she thinks to herself, is heading for a bitter campaign of polarised opinions on that one.

It is nearly eight when she drives up to the Pilars’ front door. Tina answers the double fronted door and shows Susan in to the hall. Linda is in bed and Susan is to go on up. There is no sign of Ken. She sees the children through the open lounge door and spends a few minutes in idle banter with them before climbing the broad stairs and making for Linda’s bedroom. She calls out ‘Hi’ as she taps on the open door and Linda greets her likewise.

Linda looks well, she thinks, as she hugs her and puts the supermarket flowers she has bought on the bed. Linda wants to know how Susan is coping after the adverse publicity and Susan reassures her that she is OK - better than she thought she might feel, thanks in part to her boss. She does not want to be drawn further just yet and says they can talk more another time. Susan wants to hear how Linda is doing.

“And where’s Ken?” she asks.

“Downstairs in the study, Susan. Close the door, will you? There’s a war going on here and I need some advice.”

Susan does so and sits on a chair by the bed as Linda tells her that she is about to be ‘outed’ by the papers. Linda put the phone down on the journalist, Sarah King, and has spent most of the time since worrying about what to do. She eventually decided to ring Sarah King just before the children came home from school. Susan’s thoughts go straight back to the article she has just read in the City Tribune, She knows, but does not say, that Linda has cause to fear both papers, the local city paper and the national tabloid.

The journalist tried to pump Linda again about Jane and there was a fair amount of vying for information in the call. Linda eventually gleaned that the paper intends to lead tomorrow with a political piece on the University, stating that homosexuality among students and lecturers alike is causing concern to the University’s governing body, to students’ parents, if not to students, and to the University’s spiritual leaders including the chaplain. Linda and Jane, Linda assumes, will be named. Sarah King did not say whether they would be exposed but it does not take a genius to work out that this is about to happen. Linda sounds bitter, and defeated.

A copy of the City Tribune is on the bed. Linda points at it and asks Susan if she has seen it. Susan knows that Linda is referring to the article on homosexuality and that the fact that media are now likely to run a major piece of journalism on the subject. She nods gravely to indicate that she has seen the article and that the situation is not good for her friend. Susan knows that this is going to be a different sort of expose than the one she has just experienced. This is going to be a story that will run and run and in which personalities, with her friend possibly at the centre of the outcry, will be trapped as the thing gathers its momentum.

“Does Jane know about it?”

“I haven’t been in touch. Do you think I should ring her?” Linda asks, her eyes somehow pleading.

Susan nods.

“You do that and if I hear Ken coming upstairs, I’ll go out and divert him. OK?”

Linda lifts the phone and rings the number. It is the answer phone. She does not leave a message.

“There are some things you don’t leave on tape.”

Susan agrees.

“Do the kids know any of this, Linda?”

Linda gives her a grimace.

“That’s why Ken and I are not speaking. I decided today that it’s now inevitable that I’m going to be exposed. The children need to be forewarned. Ken won’t hear of it. At the moment, he’s sulking in the study. I haven’t told him everything but anyone with any sense can see that the children have to be told. He’s adamant. We had as big a row as I can ever remember - well, as big a row as you can have quietly with two children in the house.”

Susan smiles slightly.

“So, what does Ken think should happen, then?” This seems the obvious next question to Susan.

“It’s half term next week and he thinks all he has to do is take the children out of school tomorrow and over to Spain for a couple of weeks. It’s crazy - even if he protected them for a couple of weeks, they are still going to find out.”

“And if they are going to find out, better that it comes from you than from the papers. God knows what spin they’ll put on it.” Susan is talking as much to herself as to Linda.

“Quite.”

As Linda says this, the door opens and Ken is there. Susan dismisses a thought that he has been listening at the door. He looks nothing if not confrontational but steadies himself to hold on to some degree of cold politeness towards Susan.

“Ken. Hello.” Susan goes over to him and kisses his cheek, keen to defuse the moment. She does not relish this scenario of being caught between husband and wife but decides, nonetheless, on forthrightness.

“Linda has been telling me about the press. This could be tough all round.”

“You would know, Susan, wouldn’t you, after this morning? Perhaps none of this,” he waves a hand at the plaster on Linda’s legs as he speaks, “Perhaps none of this would have happened if you had been slightly more conventional in your morals, Susan.”

Ken sits down on the sofa opposite the bed. Susan has the grace to look slightly embarrassed at the mention of the article but manages to remain assertive - she is not going to be put off stroke.

“Yes, I would know, Ken, and thankfully I’ve only got myself to consider. It’s different for Linda. She has Angela and Kenny.” She turns to look at Linda to seek her approval to continue and then goes on as Linda nods. “Linda believes that it would be better if the children heard about this from her or from both of you.”

Ken shows an obdurate side to himself that Susan has not seen before.

“There will be no one telling my children anything except myself. And I will decide when they are told anything. And what they will be told.” He looks at Linda, threatening, almost. He continues, as if to ease the force of what he has just said.

“Angela is too young to understand any of this. But this is anathema, Susan. How do you imagine Kenny will take this?”

Susan feels her anger well inside her but contains it. She looks at Linda who is looking defeated and helpless in the bed, before confronting Ken.

“They will both take it much as you present it to them. Ken, listen to me. There is nothing wrong with two women loving each other. It’s as simple as that. And that, Ken, is what the children need to hear. You may not like it, Ken, because it’s your wife. But that’s a different matter. No one wants his or her partner to care for someone else. Fair enough. But children can be helped to understand that adults can love more than one person. It’s not as if the children are losing either of you, Ken. Linda and you are staying together, aren’t you? The children need to hear that from both of you.”

“Your morals hardly put you in a position to comment, Susan, if I may say so.” Ken rises from the sofa and turns towards the door, as he says this.

Susan retaliates, unable to suppress her own anger.

“This is no time to be getting back at Linda through the children. And that is precisely what you are doing, Ken.”

There is silence, the air filled with Ken’s wrath. He turns and marches out, slamming the door behind him.

“I have made things worse, Linda.”

“No. Just brought them out into the open. That’s how bad things are.” Linda shuts her eyes wearily. Susan comes over to the bedside.

“Linda, you have to tell the children yourself. You don’t have a choice. And Ken can’t bully you into silence. Nor can you let him take them away from you. Not just now. You are their mother, for God’s sake. You have to tell them and quickly, before the papers do.”

Susan watches Linda rally and strengthen, once again. She knows now her friend will talk to the children.

“Call them, Susan, would you?”

Susan goes in to the hall and down the stairs. She enters the lounge where Ken and Tina are sitting with the children. Ken is pretending to be reading a medical journal.

“Your Mum wants to see you, Angela and Kenny.”

The children know from Susan’s voice that there is no question of saying they will go up after the TV programme finished. They look at their father who puts the magazine down and clearly realizes what is about to happen. He takes a few moments to think. He is not going to stop the children going upstairs. But they are not going alone.

He gets up with a glare at Susan.

“I’ll come with you, Chaps. Let’s go and see what your mother wants. Tina, can you show Susan out when she is ready to go.” He does not look at Susan again before leaving the room. Tina watches the whole thing, silently aware that something serious is happening. She looks at Susan when the others had gone out of the room.

“You’d better ask Linda,” is all Susan says. She gives Tina a grave smile and heads out to her car. It occurs to her that she might just have done some good for her friend and her children. It is a good feeling.

CHAPTER 27

Ken lands the papers on the bed without a word. There is nothing about Linda and Jane in it. A quiet descends on the house as Ken takes the high moral ground that the children have been needlessly involved and upset. Meanwhile the whole family let the events of the previous evening sink in in their own individual ways.

Linda sits in bed now, cuddling an apparently oblivious Angela – oblivious except for the fact that she seems to have regressed by several years overnight. Neither Ken nor Kenny has much to say this morning and Tina tells Linda later in the morning that father and son have gone off to the river to fish. If Tina is au fait with the situation, she says nothing but Linda strongly suspects that she is aware, at very least, that the family is in deep crisis.

As Angela sits beside her on the bed and absorbs herself in the morning TV programmes for schools, Linda lets her mind drift to Jane and to the likely consequences for her junior colleague if the press carries out their stated intention to publish. She knows that Jane is young, and culturally and professionally mobile. Her credentials will guarantee her employment elsewhere if she chooses to run from any scandal that the press creates for them both. Despite her ability to survive, the implications for Jane of a press exposé could still be serious. She could have a difficult time in the workplace just through the attitudes of some people towards homosexuality. And she would suffer at the hands of her peers because she involved herself with her boss. Linda does not know what overt or covert pressure the University as Jane’s employer might put her under. If that happened, there would be little or nothing that Linda could do to protect her.

Then there is Harry, Jane’s brother. Linda suspects that Harry will be supportive. But what a dreadful thing for a brother to have to do – support a younger sister who is being dragged through the gutter press. She wonders too, what brother and sister will do about Jane’s nearly estranged parents. Can such an exposé be kept from them, across a continent in Colorado? And are Jane’s parents not due to make a trip to the city to see Jane later in the autumn? Linda remembers Jane sitting on a beach in Llanes, wondering about the wisdom of introducing Linda when they visit. That seems to be small beer now.

Despite the strong temptation to do so and despite her feelings in the hospital, Linda has not contacted Jane. Something tells her not too, even though she did make an unsuccessful call when Susan was with her. She desperately wants to speak to Jane and to warn her but something holds her back. It is not just the fear of Ken’s reaction if he finds that the two women were in touch. It is something to do with the fear that their relationship, so perfect till the press got a hold of it, might now look sullied and dangerous in Jane’s eyes. She wonders if there is any realistic possibility after press involvement that Jane will wait for her. It was a big enough thing to ask before all this hung over them. But Jane now has her career, the rest of her life, and her family to consider. Or at least, she will soon enough. In all these circumstances, she can hardly be expected to just suspend her life until Linda is free.

The very best that Linda can hope for - and here, this morning, it seems a pretty forlorn hope - is that Jane will somehow manage to stay in her job and complete her research. That would give Linda some continuing contact with her. It does not occur to her to want to sever the tie. That is not an emotional option for Linda. No, She can only hope that Jane’s commitments that she talked about - finishing the Hebrides research, writing it up and then writing a book for American children who know about ancient times only through cartoons - will hold her to the University and close to Linda for the next academic year. Perhaps by then they will have managed to weather whatever storm is coming.

She wants to smell Jane’s hair and to be stroking it as she is stroking Angela’s just now. She needs to hear her infectious laugh just once more. It is more than she can bear not to lift the phone and just listen to Jane’s voice on the answer phone. And another thought occurs to her. She remembers the small of the night conversations that she and Jane shared about Jane’s desire to have a child, when Linda and she are eventually together. They talked about an arranged pregnancy. Perhaps the need for a child will mean that Jane will find a conventional male female relationship. She is in her thirties after all and she does not have much time left for that. Linda cannot think about Jane in a relationship with a man.

She is torturing herself. There is no other way to describe it. She is torturing herself in the vacuum of the wait to see what the press will do to them; in the vacuum of her marriage; in the vacuum of Jane’s absence.

Shaking herself out of her mood, her thoughts go to Susan and to the Ramsey business. She surmises that Susan’s main concern is bound to be her threatened career. Nothing will be more important to her than that. Ramsey has put that in jeopardy. Susan will now have to put all her energies into damage limitation and into saving her career at all costs. She should perhaps marry Bill as soon as she can, and get back to work and into the public eye the moment that her face repairs. She has a strong public following and the article might well not be believed. There still has to be a chance for Susan. There will be no chance, Linda doubts, if the public believes the ‘Sex Romp’ article. Despite herself, she again feels the resentment towards her friend for the plight they are now in. How could someone be so blinkered to the consequences of their actions as Susan has clearly been?

Suppressing these thoughts and the impulse to tell her friend just what she is feeling, she rings Susan when Angela heads off in response to Tina’s call to have some juice. They talk for a while about the aftermath of Susan’s visit last evening and about the difficult job Linda had in telling her children that she might be in the papers. Nothing will ever let Linda forget the look of incomprehension on Angela’s face at the idea that her mother would be talked badly of for having a friend like Jane. Kenny understood. He asked if his mother was having a relationship with Jane. He kind of crumbled in front of her as she said that she was. He crumbled more for the hurt to his father than over Linda’s love for Jane. He just looked at his father, saying nothing. It took both of them, Ken and Linda united momentarily, to reassure him that the family was not going to split up. It was painful, and still is, as she describes it to Susan. But Susan can only understand to a point. She does not have children or the depth of feeling that they engender. Susan is sympathetic but also matter of fact. Nothing can be said now in the papers that could hurt the children in the same way that it would if the whole thing came out of the blue. Linda sees the truth of this.

She changes the subject to ask what the impact of the article about Susan has been. She hears Susan take a long inward breath before telling her that Jonathon has been round and that her TV Company are backing her. But her tone is almost flippant when she says that she has lost Bill along the way.

“What?” Linda almost shouts, “You don’t mean he’s abandoned you?”

“Yes,” Susan comes back. Then she manages to recount what she elected to withhold the previous evening in the immediacy of the Pilar family crisis.

“Bill engaged a private detective to check Ramsey out. But this man Shand decided to check me out too. He found out about Alberto. Then he told Bill. And the rest, as they say, is history.”

All that Linda can mutter is that she is so sorry. But Susan has rallied – that is clear. She tells Linda about her drive to the coast and about her decision to move on from Bill; to accept her sexuality. Susan’s is a resilience born of defence, Linda knows that, and it is a resilience that she herself could never find in like circumstances.

Linda knows that now is neither the time nor the place but she asks anyway. She asks with kindness in her voice, kindness that is almost genuine.

“Susan, do you know why you are like this?”

There is a silence as if Susan is genuinely reflecting, and then she says, slowly,

“No. I truly don’t. Nothing dreadful ever happened to me, or anything like that. Maybe I just loved Dad too much.” She is laughing as she utters this last sentence.

“I doubt whether that’s it, Susan. You are hardly going through life seducing every man as your father, are you? But your father obviously had some significance or you would not have said that just now.”

But Susan has closed down. Linda changes the subject.

“Had you thought that you might hear something from Brenda Ramsey?”

“Oh God. No. I hadn’t thought about it at all.” Susan groans.

Forewarned is forearmed, they both agree, and they both also agree that it would be politic for Susan to have her answer phone on all the time for the foreseeable future.

Linda passes her day from there by managing the running of the house from her bed, ably assisted by Tina. Ken and Kenny return for supper but they keep themselves to themselves and Linda sinks into a deeper state of depression and foreboding than she has ever known. She determines that pain or no pain, she is going to get out of this bed at the earliest opportunity. That way, she will at least feel less trapped and powerless. As she puts her light out, uncomfortable after yet another day without exercise, she knows that all she has to look forward to is the arrival, along with their usual broadsheets, of the newly ordered tabloid. Only now as she drifts in and out of sleep does it occur to her to wonder where the paper got the story from about her and Jane. This keeps her thinking in the small hours. Only Jane, she, Susan and Ken know of their relationship. Well, Harry does as does Jane’s women friends, Jacky and Nicola. Hector obviously suspected when they came back from the dig and he clearly had a thing for Jane. But would any of these people have sufficient motive, let alone sufficient pure evil about them, to want to destroy them with the stroke of some prurient journalist’s pen? Surely not. But someone tipped off the press. Who was it? And is it connected in any way to the exposé of Susan? And what about the car attack? In the small hours, fear and paranoia are not too distant and Linda is afraid.

But next morning there is still nothing in the press and apart from feeling tired, Linda feels better altogether. Everyone except Tina is out. It is towards ten o’clock when she sees the Police Inspector, with the woman sergeant at the driving wheel, pull into the drive in a black saloon. Tina shows them up as soon as she has checked that Linda will see them. She leaves them, saying that she is going into the garden and that Linda should just call from the window if she needs anything. Tina gives the police a very old fashioned look as if to say “don’t be upsetting my boss” as she leaves.

“Just a few more questions, if I may, Mrs Pilar,” Inspector Philips says. “Sorry to have to interview you in here.” His hand waves around the room as the policewoman quietly takes up a standing position near the door. The Inspector is, he advises her, double-checking all the possibilities.

“But I thought that Dave Ramsey had confessed?”

“He’s still helping us with our enquiries, Mrs Pilar. As you can appreciate, we don’t want to discount any other possibility.”

“But there must be forensic evidence, I take it? The car would have been damaged, surely?”

“Well, that’s just the question, Mrs Pilar. We have checked the car that Ramsey owns. It has no marks on it.”

Linda is listening now, her fears of the night coming momentarily back into focus. Is there still an attacker on the loose? Are the children safe? The Inspector looks at her closely. She looks back now at Inspector Philips - a tall, moustached man in his early forties, broad, good looking and every inch a policeman. She barely took account of him earlier when he interviewed her.

“I take it,” she said, “That you don’t know for sure who did this. Are you still sure that it was it deliberate?”

“That’s right, we don’t know yet whether Miss Blakely or you was the target, whether one of you was or whether both of you were. And, yes, we are still almost certain that it was deliberate. Can you tell us about your friendship with Doctor Gray?”

She is taken aback by the abruptness of the question. It was obviously meant to catch her off guard. But Linda is gathering her thoughts fast, not sure what Ken told the police about Jane and her.

“I work with her, of course. And we are friends. I was on holiday with her in Spain. It was recently, in fact. We stayed with Ken’s parents. The children, Ken and I go out there every year and Jane wanted to see the Pilgrims’ Route to Santiago. She came over to spend a few days with us all afterwards.”

“Do you know where she was last Friday evening, the night of the attack?”

The question is so predictable but it still shocks Linda. It makes her feel outraged and afraid all at once. She remains calm, giving the air that the question is reasonable but funny.

“Jane? You don’t think she had anything to do with this, do you? She is a friend of mine, for God’s sake. And of Susan, for that matter.”

“But she was back in the city?”

“Yes. Inspector, why ask me all this? Why not ask Jane? I’m sure that she can sort any doubts you might have.”

We already have questioned her,” he says, emphasising the word ‘have’.

The picture of Ken pointing Jane out to the police in the hospital comes back to Linda. The Inspector continues,

“She says that she had supper with two women friends. We have the names and addresses of the two friends”

The detective’s face is inscrutable.

“Do you know these two women, Mrs Pilar – Jacky Jones, and Nicola Grisham?”

Linda nods, seeing where the line of enquiry was going.

“Mrs Pilar, do you know anyone who could have wanted to harm you?”

“I don’t. No.”

“What about your husband? Is there any reason for him to be angry with you?”

Linda looks at the detective, steadies herself and says,

“Not to my knowledge, no.”

“Doctor Gray says that you and she are friendly. Were you on holiday with her in the Hebrides?”

“No. We were working together on a University archaeological dig. We were leading it.”

“I see. You returned together?”

“Yes.”

“You were in Spain together?”

“Yes.”

“Between the time when you returned from the Hebrides and when you went out to Spain were you at your own home all the time?”

She knows now that Ken has told the police something.

“You were alone with Doctor Gray for some days?” the policeman continues.

“Yes.”

“At her flat?”

“Yes.”

“Is there anything you can tell us, Mrs Pilar, about Jane Gray, and the circles she moves in?”

“I don’t think so, Inspector. Inspector, is she under some sort of suspicion here?”

“We are just making enquiries at this stage. We are trying to find out if there is anyone close to either of you, you or Miss Blakely, who could have done this.” He is watching her closely but she senses he is not going to take this line of questioning further - for now at least.

“What about Susan Blakely? Do you know of anyone, other than Ramsey, who might want to harm her?”

“No.”

His next question takes her by surprise again.

“Mrs Pilar. Are there any people in your life who could be angry with you and Jane?”

She feels dumbfounded.

“People I know?”

“Yes. Someone who might have known about your friendship with Jane and felt, shall we say, jealous or usurped?”

She gives Hector’s name, against her better judgment.

She feels the eyes of the police officers on her as they stand up to leave. Ken is still nowhere in sight and is presumably still out with the children. Tina is now hovering in the open hall. Linda hears her coming upstairs as the police officers leave.

“If only Jane hadn’t come to see me in the hospital,” she curses to herself, horrified at the line of questioning that has just happened as a direct result of that.

“No,” she thinks, “The police would have been round to Jane’s flat anyway, asking exactly the same questions. Ken obviously told them enough to put suspicion onto her. The police are looking for motives and, yes,” Linda acknowledges to herself, “Ken would have a motive himself. But surely not - he has got what he wanted. Jane is out of the way and he has his wife back.”

The thought that Jane might have motive is simply one that she dismisses out of hand.

She was not about to put Ken’s name in the frame to the police. Things are bad enough without her husband thinking that she might have suspicions about him. With cold recognition, she realizes that if anyone would have motive, if she was indeed the intended victim, then it was both Ken as the betrayed husband, and Jane as the rejected lover. Thank God for Jane having the alibi of having supper with Jacky and Nicola - although Linda could not imagine that either of them relished a corroborating interview with police officers.

This is all beyond her wildest of probabilities of what could be the truth of the matter. But she can quite see what the police angle on all this is. How could the police know that Ken is a gentle man? He is a man who is just fighting to protect his children and his marriage. Isn’t he?

She has heard that men can react with almost incomprehensible outrage at the knowledge of a lesbian relationship between their partner and another woman. But Ken, Ken driving a car at her? No. Not possible. And Jane, a jilted lover, doing the driving? That is even less possible.

What scares her in the moments after the police call is the fact that the ideas are not so far removed from some of her free-floating fears of the night.

Susan runs up the stairs and into Linda’s room, just ten minutes after the police leave. She was trying to contact Linda but the answer phone was on and she could not get through.

She more or less confirms the new line that the police have just taken with Linda. She had a phone call herself from Inspector Philips just thirty minutes ago. They now think that there is every possibility that the car attacker was not Dave Ramsey. Their advice to Susan was to be on her guard until the perpetrator is identified.

The two women sit over coffee for an hour, twisting their minds to all the possibilities of who might want to harm them singly or together. There is no one possibility that makes more sense to them than that it was Ramsey. They conclude after all their debate that the police will undoubtedly find the evidence to support Ramsey’s confession. What other sensible explanation can there be?

The sound of Ken arriving home with the two children breaks off their deliberations. The family come into the room, Ken clearly not too pleased to see Susan here. Suddenly Ken is seeing even Susan as an unhealthy influence on his wife. But Linda is not about to brook any interference in her life like this. She makes it quite clear in front of Ken that she and Susan will be keeping in very close touch. She even finds herself provoking Ken by saying in a voice loud enough for him to hear from the next room that when she is mobile again she would not mind a day or two away in Paris or London with Susan. They intend to celebrate the end of a bad time.She doubts whether they will ever do this trip but at least for the moment it takes away the sense of being trapped. In that exchange, in fact, Linda determines to get herself on to crutches and out of this bedroom just as quickly as she can. If she and Kenny are going to hold on to their mother and son relationship, she needs to be up and putting energy into the talking that needs to be done. Pain or no pain in her leg, she is not about to just lie here and let her family disintegrate in front of her eyes. She has her own career to salvage in due course and a life to get on with. The war of silence between her and Ken has to stop and she is probably the stronger of the two in terms of making sure that happens.

As for the fears of the press and of whoever drove the car at them, she has to show whoever it was that she is made of sterner stuff than to break under their attacks.

In the evening, she insists on going downstairs, aided by Ken on one side and Tina on the other. She props herself in the kitchen and although little is said, somehow the presence of Linda in her own kitchen brings a normality back to the family atmosphere that has not been there since before they were all in Spain together. For a few hours she feels that life is as it has always been. At bedtime Ken brings his nightwear from the guest room and sleeps by her side. They do not make love nor does either of them want to.

CHAPTER 28

Dave Ramsey was not responsible for the car attack on Susan and Linda. The first he heard of it was on the Saturday at teatime, the evening after it happened, when the police came to the door. He was on his own - Brenda was as usual over at her parents. He was engaged once again in his academic studies.

They had not had radio or television on and Brenda had gone out mid morning to go over to see her parents and then on to the cinema. Dave listened to classical music all day, enjoying having it playing quietly in the background as he read.

The doorbell rang towards five o’clock on Saturday evening. Inspector Peter Philips introduced himself. Another plain clothed officer accompanied him. Dave had not the first idea why they were there and then checked immediately that Brenda was not hurt in any way. She had gone across the city in the car.

As Dave showed them into the sitting room the officers confirmed that this was not about Mrs Ramsey. They took up position, the Inspector opposite Dave in one easy chair and the junior officer standing by the door and off to Dave’s right.

“Reverend Ramsey, we are here about Susan Blakely.

“What about Susan Blakely?” was all he asked.

The Inspector scrutinised Dave’s face.

“You will have heard about Miss Blakely’s accident?”

“No. What accident?”

“Susan Blakely was struck by a hit and run car, late last evening. Reverend Ramsey, where were you last evening?”

He looked at them, taking in the news and the police officer’s question.

“I was here. What happened to Susan? Is she injured?”

His reaction was a mix of shock and concern. The Inspector continued to watch him.

“Can you prove where you were? Did you go out?”

No, he could not prove where he was and said so to the Inspector. He had been alone. He plucked up the courage to ask whether he was a suspect. Did the police think he had done it?

They gave him a thorough grilling. They knew his car and registration number and had already checked the vehicle. There were no marks on it. Did he have access to another vehicle?

No. They knew about his taped suicide message to Susan Blakely, the one he made in the Spring. They played the tape to him. He confirmed that it was his voice. They had his anonymous letter, the one he had written to Bill Nicholson. Dave confirmed that he wrote the letter. How well did Reverend Ramsey know Miss Blakely? Did he know Linda Pilar? They still did not tell him how Susan was.

He knew he had committed no crime. He said so. He simply told the truth. He had a sexual encounter with Susan on Mull. He was guilty and depressed afterwards. He attempted suicide and ended up in hospital. Yes, psychiatric hospital. But he was well now. His wife knew everything. The church was backing him. They were helping him to put his life and career back in order. Doctor Robertson was the psychiatrist and no, he was not seeing him at the moment as he was virtually discharged. Yes, they could speak to the doctor if they chose.

He had put the liaison with Susan well behind him. The suicide attempt was over. He had no interest in seeing Susan Blakely again and certainly no intention of harming her. Any harm, he had done to himself.

The Inspector listened and challenged. But Dave had chosen to tell the truth, he said, and to cooperate fully. He knew that he had nothing to do with this attack and that he had nothing to hide. He asked again how Susan and her friend were and this time the Inspector gave him the facts. Dave listened, looking sad and compassionate for both women.

The interview lasted for about an hour. He had no objection to them looking through his things and he sat quietly while they looked in his wardrobe and in his study. The police made it clear without saying much that he remained a suspect but they left, saying simply that they might want to speak to him again. They would also want to speak to Mrs Ramsey.

Susan listens to this account from a remarkably open Inspector Philips. They are sitting in the police station, Susan having taken the bull by the horns, so to speak. She went in after talking with Linda to see what she could find out. Now she is listening to the account of the policeman’s first interview with Ramsey.

“And you believed him?” she asks, taking a sip of canteen coffee from the polystyrene cup.

“Not at the time, no. I thought that he was acting and acting well. But we had nothing to go on. Then it looked like a gift when he walked into the police station and confessed. He seemed to have all the facts at his fingertips about the attack, more than had been put out over the TV, and at that stage we thought that it was pretty well stitched up.”

Inspector Philips seems to switch focus. “We learned more about his anonymous letters, by the way. He wrote to the City Tribune as well as to Mr Nicholson, your fiancée.”

“Yes. I suspected as much. He also wrote to Jonathon, my boss at the Company.”

“Anyway,” The Inspector continues, “He told us when he confessed that Brenda had come in from her parents on the Saturday and he told her about the police visit and the accident. She knew already about Susan Blakely’s accident, she said, from the evening news at her parents’ home. He told her that we thought Dave might well be responsible. “Nonsense”, was apparently her response, before going off to the kitchen. That was virtually all that was said and they watched the television updates together in silence.

“What’s the significance of all this, Inspector Philips?”

“Wait, Miss Blakely. You’ll see in a moment. Apparently, Brenda Ramsey then went for the sherry bottle, something she never does, and got tanked up in the kitchen. The next thing Dave Ramsey knew was that she confessed to him that she was the one who drove at you.”

“What?” Susan can hardly credit this. Women do not do things like that.

“Brenda told Dave, apparently, that she had been approached by this detective, Shand. I believe you know him, Miss Blakely? He showed her a copy of the anonymous letter that we now know Mr Nicholson received and passed on to Shand.”

Susan groans inwardly. How could Shand have been so, so unethical? So Shand tipped the balance and showing Brenda the letter with the stick people had led her to believing Dave’s confession about their affair.

But the Inspector is ploughing relentlessly on.

“She did not blame Dave. She blamed you for the affair. She did not want to hurt Dave. She told Dave that she had borrowed her father’s car on the Friday night and then told her father she needed it to transport some older people to a coffee evening. She watched you, apparently, on and off for days and went to restaurants where you went, you and Mrs Pilar. The restaurant you chose on Friday was too small for Brenda to walk in and just get a table so she sat in the car. She says that she had no intention of doing it. She only had her father’s car so that Dave would not know what she was up to on this evening. It was impulse, rage and certainly not premeditated. When you came out of the restaurant - two women living the high life whilst she and Dave were living out a wrecked sham of a marriage - Brenda snapped. That was all there was to it.”

“So Brenda really did drive the car at us?”

“Maybe. I’ll get to that. Anyway, that was the reason Dave walked into the police station and confessed. It transpires that Brenda also told him she was pregnant and he decided to take the wrap for her. He could not face his pregnant wife going to court and probably to jail.”

“This is incredible,” Susan mutters, more to herself than to Inspector Philips. The words ‘Hell hath no fury …’ are going through her mind.

“How did you get Ramsey to tell you the truth?”

“A little help from his mentor, the Reverend Graham, did the trick. We knew there was no possibility that he’d done it as soon as his car was checked. At first we thought that he was confessing to link his name with yours in public – a sort of revenge for the failed suicide. He still believed by the way, right up till Reverend Graham was here, that you told the church authorities about your affair with him.”

Susan does not rise to the Inspector’s bait by acknowledging the truth of the affair. Instead, she asks,

“Have you got Brenda in custody now?”

“She’s being questioned at the moment. And we have gone over to look at this car of her father’s. If there is forensic evidence, that should be it.”

“And what happens to Dave?”

“Well, he’s been charged with wasting police time and perverting the course of justice. But for now he has agreed to go back into hospital under his psychiatrist – just till the heat goes off the domestic situation.”

“What a mess,” is all that Susan can think of to say. Then, “Will you keep me informed?”

“Of course. For now, though, I think that you should stick to my advice to be careful. This may not be over yet.”

She stands to leave and, as if thinking of something as a by-the-way, turns back to the Inspector and asks,

“Who did tell the church authorities about this alleged affair between Ramsey and me? Do you know?”

“I do, yes.” The Inspector hesitated a moment. “It was one of your colleagues – a Mike Moss. The Reverend Graham was able to confirm that.” The policeman watches her face carefully. It dawns on Susan moment that she is not being told all this for nothing. The police are now putting Moss in the frame. Will all this never end?

In the street, Susan takes a moment to get her mind around all of this. Mike Moss? Why? That is something that she needs to know as soon as she has the energy. And could mousy little Brenda really have done this? Does she have it in her to attack Susan out of rage and a need for revenge? Susan does not like the idea of this Police Inspector having so much information? Whatever the situation might be, she is feeling more than a little stripped bare. The only good news is that Ramsey is away in hospital for the moment. And Brenda is in custody. This makes her feel safer, somehow. Brenda has changed from being just mousy Brenda to being someone who is a force in her own right – a dangerous, unbalanced woman to be reckoned with.

Shand, Susan now realizes, must have gone to see Brenda again after Susan last had coffee with her and after her last phone call with her. If Susan is going to hold on to any sanity in all this, she has to go with her instincts. And her instincts still tell her that Brenda originally believed Susan’s version of events on Mull and that her husband made the story up about them in his delusional state. Shand going to see her and showing her one of the stick people letters probably tipped a pretty dodgy balance. It occurs to her now that it is no wonder that Brenda made no attempt to contact Susan in hospital. At the time she was too ill to notice but it now occurs to her that Brenda is just the type to at least send a sentimental get well soon card. Still, Susan can hardly credit that Brenda has it in her to attack Linda and her with the full force of a car, sudden rage or no sudden rage. And what about this pregnancy? Is it true? Did Brenda conceive on the night when Dave took her without her consent?

“Christ, she blasphemes aloud, with no thought to the religious significance of what she is saying, “will this couple never get out of my life?”

It is going to be a long wait to hear from Inspector Philips. She has no idea how to fill the time. She is still off sick, hardly presentable in public with her face the way it is - more discoloured, it seems, as the days go on. Linda has her own preoccupations. Bill is out of her frame, she assumes for good. She could go and find Mike Moss and see what he has to say for himself about going to the church authorities. But she knows that she cannot do so without the humiliation of being told what she can already guess – that he simply set a hair running after she declined his advances and out of spite. It was clever of him not to go to her bosses - they would have done nothing. Yes, it was very clever indeed to go Ramsey’s bosses. Perhaps he even did go to her bosses. Who cares at this stage? No. Going to the church was a stroke of mischievous genius on his part.

“Typical of a man with a ponytail,” she rants to herself, illogical as that thought is.

The thought of seeing Alberto appeals but she remembers the private detective. She does not want to be under any scrutiny just now, whether from Shand, or Sarah King or God knows who else. She will have to content herself with waiting for her face to repair and somehow try to relax.

She knows what she could do, though. She could go and see Jane. Linda might not be in a position to find out how the poor girl is doing and whether the press have been on to her but she is.

“And that would be one in the eye for Ken,” she thinks with delight. Yes, that is just what she can do – she will go and see Jane.

It is no problem to find Jane’s flat. They ate near it, the three of them, on the evening Linda brought Jane with her to the fish restaurant on the harbour front. Jane’s name is in the phone directory but instead of ringing her first, Susan goes round on impulse and Jane’s voice tells her immediately that she is delighted to hear her.

The flat impresses Susan. It is bright, tidy and minimalist in a sophisticated way. This is a woman with taste. Jane herself looks wan - that is the best way to describe her. It does not take more than a glance to see that under the smile is a strained and weary face.

Jane is happy to talk. As she makes a pot of coffee at the breakfast bar and brings it over to the sofas, she tells Susan that she has been finding the days impossible. Daily, she wants to be in touch with Linda and the only thing holding her back is the threat that that could pose to Linda over the children. If anything, she is holding on to the time when they will both be back at the University and she can at least see Linda.

“Won’t that be hard, though?” Susan asks, sipping the Columbian coffee as she does so.

“Well, sure, but I’d rather try to go on working with her and seeing her that way than live in this vacuum,” Jane reflects.

Susan resists the urge to persuade Jane to go and see Linda at home.

“Do you know that a newspaper is on to Linda and me?” Jane asks now, quietly watching for Susan’s reaction.

“Yes. Linda knows, too. She tried to contact you, but you were out and she did not want to leave a message. Then she calculated that you would know anyway. That’s partly why I came – to see how you are bearing up. What happened? Do you know how they know?”

“No. I have not the first idea. I just know that when I was coming out of the lift at the hospital after the police interviewed me, a youngish woman - younger than me, I’d say and sort of scruffily dressed - came right up to me and asked if I’d been to see Linda. I just thought at first that she was one of Linda’s students. So I said I had just seen her and that Linda was going to be fine. Then she said that her name was Sarah something. I can’t remember her second name.”

“King, I think,” Susan interrupts.

“Yes. Sure. That’s right. Anyway, she shot the question at me. ‘Jane - are you and Linda Pilar lovers?’ I didn’t know what to say. At first I wanted to say that we were. It was so natural to say that we are when I’m so proud of her. Then I thought about the kids and decided to say ‘no’. It felt like a betrayal, a lie.”

“Well, I can see that, Jane. It would feel like a dreadful thing to do. But on the other hand you have protected Linda and the kids and that is her strongest wish just now. I am sure that you did the right thing. At least the press can not quote your ‘admission’, and that is how they would interpret it, believe me.”

Poor Jane. Here she is, all fired with the ideals of the younger person and feeling alone and a liar, a betrayer of what is most dear to her. Susan can say little to comfort her, but Jane fills the moment by saying that Susan’s presence somehow makes Linda feel closer. Will Susan tell Linda that she has visited? Susan says that, of course, she will and she will also tell Linda what has been said.

She asks now about Jane being interviewed by the police. Jane was not fazed by her interview with Inspector Philips but she just felt that she had been categorised by the police as a potentially dangerous person, purely because she is gay. Whether that is just in her head or how it really was, she has no way of really knowing. Susan just listens. At least, she points out as Jane describes how she was with her two women friends on the night of the attack, she has a rock solid alibi and does not have that to worry about.

Jane laughs her agreement and then, thinking of it for the first time, asks Susan if she or Linda thought that she might have done it. It is Susan’s turn to laugh.

“Not for one second. Of course, not.”

Susan enjoys her time with Jane. She is a refreshingly nice person, a genuine, straightforward sort and a relief from all the intrigue that is a part of her own life at the moment. They make a pact, the two of them. Linda might not be able to socialise with Jane. But Susan certainly can and there is not a thing that the mighty Ken can do about it. Not for that reason, Jane assures her, but because she really enjoys Susan’s company, Jane would love to see Susan again. They agree to meet as soon as things have quietened a bit. And if anything appears in the press about Linda and Jane, Susan will ring her.

She is very glad that she visited Jane. And she is even more glad to be able to ring Linda later in the day to bring her up to speed about Ramsey and to tell her that Jane is all right. She is going back to the University and Linda will at least see her there.

Susan arrives back to her flat just as Inspector Philips is getting out of his car and approaching her door. It is only a matter of hours since they talked at the police station.

There are few courtesies from him, just a look that tells her that there is more news. She lets him in and leads him into her lounge. He stands, taking in her home at a glance and declining her invitation to sit.

“Well, Miss Blakely,” He says, coming straight to the point, “We can now eliminate Brenda Ramsey from our enquiries. There was no mark on her father’s car.”

Susan is hardly surprised at this news, the only question being why Brenda confessed to her husband.

“Go on, Inspector, tell me, “ she gives an exaggerated sigh, “The butler did it.”

The Inspector smiles.

“Would that it were that simple. The fact is - we are now drawing a blank. There is no forensic evidence until we do find the car. And several people had motive. Several others had opportunity. And reluctant as I am to admit it, at this point in time, I just do not know what to think.”

“What was Brenda up to, telling Dave Ramsey that she did it?” Susan asks.

“Winding Dave up to confessing in order to get revenge for your affair with him – that was what drove her. She admitted to that. As soon as she saw the anonymous letter, she wanted revenge. When you were attacked, she was outside the restaurant watching you and Linda. You recall that I told you that she has been spying on the pair of you? She saw the car go for you but she swears she did not see the make of the vehicle or the driver. When you were injured and Dave was the suspect, she saw her chance to get revenge on him and she calculated that his confession would expose you at the same time. It was clever and it nearly came off, but she is still not the person behind the attack.”

“What happens to her now?”

“Nothing too severe, unfortunately. Certainly, whatever they do with her it won’t be severe enough for me. She has been charged with wasting police time and that will go to court but I doubt whether there will be a custody sentence in this.”

Susan sighs. Yet again, there is the likelihood of things coming out in court. Brenda’s motive for wasting police time was her husband’s adultery with Susan. Just great.

The Inspector sits down now and Susan knows that there is more coming.

“Miss Blakely, what can you tell me about Mike Moss and about why he would have told the church about you and Dave Ramsey?”

CHAPTER 29

Minutes become hours. Hours become days. Days, she hope, will eventually become weeks. There is no press story about her and Jane. The days shorten with the incoming autumn. Linda is mobile within a few days of coming downstairs, using crutches and finding muscles that she did not know could ache so much. A semblance of normality descends on the Pilar household and sometimes it seems, even to Linda, as if the events of the summer are just some aberration of her memory. Only the sight of the shells at the side of her bed stays as real proof that Jane was a part of her life for such a significant but short time. The shells and the constant ache as she wakes or lets her mind go to the times that they had shared in the Hebrides and in Santiago are proof. She cannot wear Jane’s ring - to all outward appearances she is back in her marriage with Ken.

Ken tries - she has to give him that. He looks after her, enquires after her needs and tries to be the person he was before all this happened. But the paradox is proving to be true that the more one tries to make things the same, the more they are by definition different. Their intimacy is gone. They have had sex but it was as lonely a place for Ken as it was for her. She was not repulsed or anything like that. It was just not the experience that she wanted to be having when it happened. The memory of Jane’s lovemaking made Ken’s actions simply mechanical. He turns his back afterwards as often as she does.

The children have adjusted to the near return to normality. Angela has come out of her shell of regression and all that Linda ever said to Kenny about Jane was that she and his father both love him and that they will be together as always. As for Jane, she is a nice woman and has been very important to Linda. Linda heard herself use the past tense. Kenny said nothing. He just listened and went back to his computer. After that, he behaved as usual and was seemingly more preoccupied with the trials of adolescence and all that entails than he was with Linda’s troubles. He brought his pals in to watch rugby on the TV and apart from the absence of lager cans, which would undoubtedly come later, it was a scene that Linda imagined would be repeated over a good few years to come. He went off abseiling with the school and seemed to master the skill quickly. His voice was deepening and he was showing every sign of being an all round accomplished sportsman. He is living life to the full at home and away from it and Linda cannot be sure whether the slight distancing between her and Kenny is the result of the normal preparation of adolescence for leaving the nest or of talking to him about the press. She sees that now as perhaps an unnecessary family crisis – a crisis that was occasioned by her own insistence that the children should be told about the possibility of a smear against her name. Perhaps Ken was right and they should have left well alone.

She returns to work two weeks after the start of term, unable to tolerate her enforced idleness any longer, and somewhere in her mind knowing that she has to at least see Jane. That was a thought that she did not allow to linger in her conscious mind for too long. She is determined that she will give her employers not one single excuse to say that she and Jane are behaving inappropriately in the workplace. She will see the woman only on the same basis as she would see any of her colleagues - strictly in the course of business.

It is strange to hobble on her crutches into the Department and to be welcomed by her secretary and by colleagues. She missed all the start of term business and her own department is in full swing. All right, she planned the term from the house and the communications have flowed backwards and forwards but she still feels like a stranger at one level - a stranger and something of a short-term celebrity because of the car attack.

She makes it to her office without too much difficulty but it is tiring and her movement around the department, the lecture halls and the campus is going to be limited. She chooses to have coffee and sandwiches in her room and only to go down to the lecture and seminar rooms when she is taking classes. Her Department is twenty strong and over the course of the first day virtually everyone makes a point of coming to see her, to ask how she is and to take a professional steer from her on some aspect or other of the work. Everyone comes, that is, except Jane. By the end of Linda’s first day back, Jane has not appeared. Linda sorts papers at her desk long after most people in the Department have gone home, knowing full well that she is hoping that Jane will call by. She stays on in her office until she can no longer delay her return to the family and the supper that she knows Tina is preparing.

Eventually, towards five-thirty, she takes her crutches and makes her way along to the lift. Her secretary, who insisted on staying behind until the Professor was ready to leave, is at her side. They are close to the lift when Jane appears, coming out of the small room at the end that they use for storing media technology equipment. She is in earnest conversation with Hector. She stops in her tracks, before turning to Hector, as if for some support. They will all be in the same lift and the doors are now opening.

“Hello, Jane,” is all that Linda can think of to say. She has thought about this moment for weeks and this is all that she can say.

“Hello, Linda. How are you?” Jane smiles an uneasy smile.

They are in the lift, everyone letting Linda go ahead. It is a stupid, awkward descent with banal talk from Jane and from Linda about the accident and what Linda’s first day has been like. Finally, Jane volunteers that she will have to come and see Linda about her research at some point. Linda takes the opportunity to turn to the secretary and to ask her to fix a time in the diary.

They separate at floor level. Hector, silent until now, takes Jane’s arm and announces that the best pub for that drink would be the Thirsty Duck. What does Jane think? Jane looks at Linda as she replies that that will be fine. The two women manage to take one final look at each other as they go their separate ways, Linda to the car spaces marked with wheelchairs where a taxi is waiting, Jane and Hector to the walkway that leads to the University students’ favourite pubs. If Linda thought that she detected a longing look in Jane’s eyes, she persuades herself later that she was probably kidding herself. Perhaps Jane is on the baby quest with young Hector? Young Hector would not mind that in the slightest - she knows that. The thought is more than Linda can cope with, even though Jane might well feel the same about her and Ken sleeping together these last weeks.

The next day is one that will remain with Linda for the rest of her life. It is the day on which the press publish their story about her and Linda. It sits like an accusation on the breakfast table the next morning. Ken has gone down a few minutes ahead of her. Tina is there, silently cooking eggs, her back firmly to the room. The children will not make their appearances till the last moment and after several calls up the stairs from Tina. At least that was the usual pattern of the morning departures to their various days.

It is a day that will shape Linda’s life from here. She knows right away that she will do what people with any sense or courage do in these circumstances. She decides to brave it out – she will not hide at home.

It is somewhere between seeing the strap-line - ‘The University of Lesbianism’ and reading the rage in Ken’s expression that she takes that decision. No matter what the article says, she is not taking this like a victim. It might well be crunch time but she knows that Jane and she have done nothing wrong and she will not allow herself to be stigmatised.

Ignoring Ken, she reads the article once and then again after the first shock of seeing herself described in print has abated. They are both named. As is the trip to the Hebrides, the implication being that it had been a gay jolly at public expense. The trip to Spain is there as is the fact of Jane spending time with Ken and her. The implication this time is that a three-way frolic is the only thing that could possibly have happened on the trip. Now, the article goes on, Linda is back at the University after the recent car attack. The police are still continuing their enquiries. What is the University doing, allowing all this to go on in the workplace? What about young students? And so on. This is of course why the press have not published until now. They were waiting for Linda’s return in order to maximise embarrassment to the University; to expose Linda to the full glare of publicity.

Ken is livid - there is no other way to describe his silence. He snatches the paper from Linda, storms from the kitchen and out of the room. Linda’s fear for the children leads her to shout after him,

“What are you doing?”

“I’m going to speak to the kids - what do you think I’m going to do?”

She leaves him to it. There is no point in a scene between them as well as all this. She decides that she is going to go to work. She has to be there to bat for herself. No one else will. But the children should not go to school. She turns to Tina.

“Will you have the kids at home today, Tina?”

Tina looks at her, comes over to her and puts an arm round Linda’s shoulders.

“Of course I will. Don’t you worry. All this will sort, you know.”

She has rarely felt so grateful for such kind words. It is as if Tina is momentarily her mother, protecting her and her grandchildren from the enemies outside and inside.

She stays in the hug, just saying “Thank you”. There is no need to say anything else.

It is ten minutes before Kenny and Angela came downstairs, neither of them in school attire. Ken has obviously had the same thought as herself. And to give him his due, he is calm and reasoned with the children and the two adults slip back into their well rehearsed united front teamwork. The children come and just hug her and Angela says,

“Daddy says they are saying lies about you, Mummy.”

“A lot of it is lies, yes, Darling.

Kenny wants to see for himself.

She retrieves the article and gives it to him. He reads it, pales, and looks at her with near loathing. He says nothing, just leaves the room. Tina goes after him. She is the best person to do that just now, both Linda and Ken know that.

They leave for work, Ken and she, just ten minutes later. The children and Tina are not to answer the door or the phone but they are to ring if anything untoward happens. It is quite possible that more reporters will want the story. Ken drops her at the entrance to the Department, not a word uttered between them on the short journey.

She goes straight to her office, nodding briefly at her secretary, who simply smiles and says “good morning” as she does every day and as if nothing is any different. Linda knows everyone will be talking about this and that the article will be doing the rounds. That is human nature. But, good for her secretary, she carried it off as if nothing was amiss. Linda’s first action is to ring her solicitor. She has a long-standing arrangement with Malcolm Paterson, who until now has handled things like her parents’ estate and the purchase of their home - nothing unconventional like this. What can he do to help? Luckily for Linda, Malcolm’s is a tough firm who know employment legislation backwards. Malcolm’s advice is to sit tight, do nothing and let the firm put a warning shot across the bows of the University. In these days of Human Rights legislation, he points out, there is great restraint amongst employers on issues like this. She is able to reassure Malcolm when he asks, that the trip to the Hebrides was done, as it were, by the organisational book. Malcolm wants to know for his own purposes what the relationship with Jane is, then and now, and she tells him that too. She suggests a libel case against the press for the untruths in the article but even as she asks the questions she sees the folly of that line. Malcolm is clear. He points out that the press could argue that it was in the public interest to know all this and she does not want to end up arguing what parts are true, what false. Does she? No, she says at once, she does not. Malcolm will phone the Principal. She agrees and waits.

Malcolm comes back to Linda by phone about thirty minutes later. The Principal, Linda surmises, quickly became unavailable and Malcolm Paterson finally spoke to the Head of Human Services - the personnel service. The University was aware of the article, yes. Doctor Gray and Professor Pilar were both respected colleagues. The University was considering the article. Linda’s solicitor delivered his question, asking for confirmation that there was no employment issue here. He made a reference to Human Rights legislation. Even if there were truth in the article, which of course was not the subject of his call, many people of the opposite sex were in personal relationships at work - was that not true? In fact, do a significant number of marriages not originate from the workplace? Linda listens as Malcolm indicates that the Head of Personnel appears to have been reassuring. The employment issue appears to be secured. Even so, she just hopes that the University is not reserving its position and that that was the reason that Robert Thane did not speak personally to her solicitor. Malcolm advises her, and she can only follow his advice, to carry on as usual. What Linda will never know is whether the phone call will influence the position.

She goes about her day as best she can. She sees several of her colleagues, some of whom say that they were sorry to read the article; some of whom say nothing, as if it does not exist or as if it is not worth the space of discussion. She thinks that a few might be avoiding her. She cannot be sure. But in the whole day, not one person asks her if the article is true. And for that sensitivity, she is grateful. She does not see Jane at all and the secretary says that Jane has been in, made the appointment to meet with Professor Pilar the following week and is going to write her research at home for the rest of the day.

It is four in the afternoon when she is finishing a seminar with third year students on ancient sexual rites - why did theses twists of fate make a seminar like that appear on the programme today of all days? As she leaves the room, Robert Thane appears as if just happening to pass the lecture room. He just comes over and hugs her and asks how she is coping. He points at her leg but his eyes say that the question is about the article. She mutters that she is hanging in and he suggests a drink in the University Lounge for senior staff, at end of play. She accepts with more than a little relief, knowing at the same time that it will be a gauntlet of a walk to that lounge.

Her senior colleagues are there - to a person. Robert is on his feet to help her to a seat and to see to her gin and tonic. People ask about her leg and they go on to talk the talk of academia – with not a word about the article or the fallout from it. What happened behind closed doors today with the University solicitors and the Human Resources Section, she will never know. But the line that her University is taking is clear – one of unquestioning business as usual.

She is home by taxi towards six o’clock. The children are watching TV, Ken with them. Tina has departed for her own flat and will be back in the morning. A family conference is to happen, Angela informs her importantly. She joins them. The atmosphere, she picks up right away, is calm. Ken takes the lead. The press have not bothered them today and they have to go on as a family from here, at home and at school or work. He and Linda will talk to the school and make sure that they are not troubled there by other pupils or by the newspapers. Kenny baulks at this. The whole thing is bad enough without them doing that. Linda persuades Ken to leave the school and they all compromise on a phone call to the Head the next morning. The children will go back the day after tomorrow. Angela thinks that this is great - another day off school. But Kenny is moody - Linda can see it. She knows that it is best to let Ken lead. There will be a time soon enough when she can talk in private with her son if he will let her.

It is towards eight when she finds a moment to ring Susan. She needs to gauge the reaction of her friend to the article - Susan is very balanced in her views. It is not nice to be exposed like that but the article was so off-the-wall that the main reaction in the public who matters is likely to be sympathy. Linda tells Susan about her day at work and can only see the logic of what Susan is saying. Then Susan tells her that Jane has just left her flat. Linda’s young lover has spent the later part of the day with Susan, raging at the article and trying to sort out what her reaction should be. Linda cannot help the moment of jealousy that she feels for the time Susan has just spent with Jane. But she is glad that Jane had somewhere to go. But what does Jane mean, how should she react?

Susan explains. Jane is intelligent and articulate. Why should she be browbeaten by some petty piece of journalism? It is not usually in her makeup to be a political animal in the ordinary run of events. But this is different. She has been provoked and she refuses to stand by and let that happen. She has only ever held her head up and stood for what she believes in. She is not about to be cowed into either denying who she is or running away and hiding because of it.

Jane ended up asking Susan for the names of serious journalists who might be interested in doing a profile on her. She told Susan that she was prepared to talk about being a professional, homosexual woman and what that experience is like. She will be leaving Linda out of it. This is about bigotry at this, the beginning of the twenty first century. She was quite fired up, talking to Susan and Susan tells Linda that she liked what Jane has to say. Before agreeing, she asked Jane again whether Linda would be deliberately kept out of what would be said. Jane agrees that she will and said that the children come first. Susan undertook to ring a journalist friend, regretting only that in all the current circumstances she cannot take on the article herself.

A woman called Helen Moore rang Susan and Jane back within the hour. She was a social commentator and journalist for a Sunday broadsheet, The News on Sunday, and would like to meet Jane. Jane and she had a brief conversation on the phone and decided on the general thrust of the article - the public and private aspects of coming out, helping parents and families to adjust, making the commitment to open honesty and most of all, challenging the workplace not to work to any double standard. It would be done carefully, of course, and no, Jane need not talk about anyone else. This was about the difficult times she has had, present and past but she would also talk about the positive choices she made to live as a lesbian and about the difficulties that anyone in her professional situation can face.

She has agreed to meet Helen for lunch on Friday. It is a dangerous strategy and Jane knows it. She was not quite as unafraid by the time that she left Susan’s flat but she has started down the path and is determined to continue. Jane and Susan spent some time looking for a spin that will bring a new dimension to the subject. They found it by looking at parallels between the American culture and this country. For all the free lifestyles of many people in the States, lesbian women in high-ranking senior positions can be forced to lead virtually a double identified existence. This was partly because of societal attitudes and lack of protection as a right. It was also, Jane postulated to Susan, partly the result of fear carried by women themselves. Coming out is no mean feat in any culture. Susan agreed with Jane that homophobia can be no more than a cover for the baser sentiment of sheer loathing.

There was plenty for the article. Susan only regrets that she could not get Helen to agree to them seeing advance copy. No journalist will allow that before publication.

Linda listens to all this. This is not her way and it never could be. But she has to remember that Jane is her own person and that she is younger and more fired than Linda is with the idealism of feminist thinking. She is grateful to her and to Susan, though, that her name is to be kept out of it. At one level she wishes that this article were not going to happen. It will only perpetuate the strain on her family. But then again, maybe the article writer can say some of the things that she has tried to say to Ken and which have fallen on Ken’s deaf ears.

The call ends as Susan confirms that Jane is coping remarkably well. She wanted Linda to know that she is thinking of her. Susan goes on to say that Hector is proving a useful support to Jane just now. He persuaded her that her brother and her parents should know what was going on and hear it from her rather than from any other source. Susan was with her when she rang her parents and told them. She persuaded them against coming straight over from Colorado. That, at least, was a good sign of their support for their daughter. Harry was as unflappable as ever and thought that the article she was intending might be a good thing. He admired her stand and was just thankful that he did not have to make life decisions like that.

It is a long wait until the Sunday. The article, when it appears, is well grounded and more or less as Linda anticipated it. It is odd to read about Jane through the eyes of a journalist and, alone in her room, she wonders about the wisdom of Jane feeding the press system. Only time will tell whether Jane has scored an own goal. Susan rings Linda towards lunchtime to say that she has read the article and from her viewpoint it is a good piece of journalism that can only be of use to many people in Jane’s situation. Jane had only one negative call this morning - someone from another tabloid asking her for her story on her relationship with Linda Pilar. She declined and had to put the receiver down on the journalist in mid sentence. But overall, that was the only pressure that she was put under. The perverted calls and the hate calls that she feared might happen, simply did not materialise.

Linda goes to bed this evening, at a quieter place, sensing that she has passed a watershed and that the worst of Jane’s and her moment of exposure is over. She assumes that Jane is as safe in terms of employment as she seems to be herself and at work she hears not a single word about the younger woman and the article. In a funny way it is as if the article did not exist.

Slowly the newspapers move away from the subject. For a while, though, it is a bit like living in two worlds. There is the ordinary world as she goes about the business of lecturing and managing the Department. There is the other world where she is in the spotlight. Every time she limps on her crutches into a room there is a definite change in the volume of conversation; she sees the almost imperceptible glances; she knows that she is being talked about, as are the subjects that Jane has raised; and she knows she is being discussed in her absence. The papers are still trying to run with the story but without any statement from the University, it broadens to debates about the rights and wrongs of single sex relationships and indeed, relationships of any sort in the workplace. The University has no official statement to make - it has battened down the hatches. The story peters out. Linda and Jane are yesterday’s news. The glare of publicity for Linda is dimming. The anticipation of it is proving to have been worse than the experience.

Linda is due to see Jane for her professional consultation. There is another day to wait. She has not seen Jane to speak to in private since the two articles and only knows second hand from Susan of her reactions and how she is coping. The day finally comes. Her night has been sleepless. Her morning seems interminable as she ploughs through correspondence at her desk. Her phone finally rings at twelve. It is the departmental secretary. Doctor Gray is here for her appointment. Linda assumes that Jane will want there to be no informal communication. It has been so long since she has seen Jane that she wonders how she is going to feel about her. Will she be someone different from the person she has been carrying in her mind? Or is she carrying feelings that did not really exist? Linda is nervous.

She is well prepared in terms of the workload issues that she wants to talk about with Jane. Linda seats herself behind her desk, eyes down at a paper on which she is writing. Her walking stick is balanced against the back wall and she is now out of plaster. She feels uncomfortable as she waits for Jane to come in. Finally, there is a knock on the door and Jane is in the room. Linda looks up at Jane, gives a long gentle smile and says,

“Hello, Jane.”

“Hi. How are you?”

In an instant, Linda knows that her emotions have not changed and that they are as strong as ever.

“I’m well, thank you. And glad to be back. And you?”

“Fine, thanks.” Jane sits down but only when Linda indicates to her to do so. Jane is diffident and Linda cannot gauge what this signifies.

“You are working hard, I hear.” Linda’s voice is more business-like now as she quickly turns to work. This is a model of how any two professionals greet each other and then turn to the task in hand after only a few seconds of engagement and pleasantries.

They spend an hour, Jane awkward at first, on the work of the term and the write up of the research findings. The business of the meeting absorbs them and the hour passes quickly. Linda is conscious that they had moved into that easy professional dialogue that typified their early working relationship.

Jane’s awkwardness returns as the meeting draws to its close. Linda would like to see her for a further meeting in one month’s time. Will Jane make an appointment to suit her with the secretary? She is dismissing Jane, pleasantly enough, but dismissing her none the less. She wants to say so much more but she has promised herself that that will not do her or Jane any good. A gulf has opened between the two women, and neither of them is able to bridge it.

At the door, Jane turns and catches Linda watching her. Linda just says, ‘Thank you, Jane,’ and returns to her paperwork. Jane closes the door behind her but instead of leaving has stepped back into the room

“Linda. We can’t go on not talking about things. This is crazy. I miss you.”

Linda hesitates.

“I know. I miss you too. You did well with that profile you did for Helen Moore. Congratulations.”

“Thanks. I could not sit back and do nothing, Linda. I just had to speak out. Susan was very helpful.”

“And Hector, I gather.”

Linda regrets it, the moment she utters the words. But Jane just laughs and said,

“And how is Ken? And the kids, of course?”

They look at each other, the wedge between them solidified in an instant. There is hurt in both their eyes.

There is nothing in the younger woman’s demeanour to tell Linda how Jane feels about her - nothing. Instead, she leaves with a sad slow sigh. They might have communicated well about work, but there is a chasm of silence between them on their feelings for each other.

The autumn term takes its course from this meeting. She hears little about Jane from Susan, except that Jane’s parents do come over from Colorado and that her brother Harry is to marry his long-standing girl friend. Linda and Jane have to communicate about the dig and its findings and to distribute the work in reporting the findings. They also have to plan the next summer dig back in the Hebrides which will open up the tomb they found by chance. All this is done by E-mail and the occasional face-to-face meeting with no more than ‘Hope you are well’ and ‘Take care’ as the only interpersonal communication between them. At times, Linda wonders whether what she experienced with Jane was real - thoughts she dismisses as only a reaction to the loneliness and separation she is experiencing. She keeps Jane’s photo in her wallet and this helps her to remember the time they shared in the summer. And the shells stay by her bedside. It is hard, though, very hard to go on believing that Jane will stay committed to her for the long term. Even if she still does love Linda, forces that will serve to take her life in a different direction surround Jane. How could Jane stay connected to her? They have no meaningful contact. Linda has two children who are still coming to terms with the story about Jane and their mother. She has a highflying career to protect. She has a husband. What is in it for Jane to stay committed? And what is happening between Hector and Jane?

As winter comes on, Linda struggles hard to keep depression at bay and to try to stay the happy, up beat and bright person she actually was just a few months ago. She keeps herself busy at work - there is little choice about that. And she sustains the friendships she has developed over the years in her social life. But they have dulled, these friendships, and she craves now the society of people like Nicola and Jacky and to be beside Jane in supper parties with more like-minded women.

Three weeks after the session in her office with Jane, she is at her desk when her secretary comes in with a letter. Linda sees at once is in Jane’s handwriting. It is Jane’s resignation.

Linda stares at it, knowing in this moment that she has to break her silence – to find out where Jane is going. Is she leaving the country? Is she marrying Hector? She asks her secretary if she can find Doctor Gray and ask her to came and have a word with her.

Jane appears fifteen minutes later. Linda is at her desk as before but comes round when Jane enters and indicates the coffee table and chairs for their conversation.

“Why do you feel that you have to leave, Jane?” Her tone is intended to tell Jane that this is a personal question. Jane looks at her and simply says,

“It is too hard to work with you. I still love you and this is unbearable.” She is whispering so that nothing will be heard outside the room. And her voice has a quiver to it as if she is struggling for composure.

“I love you too. But it has to be this way, Jane.”

She watches as Jane takes in that Linda still loves her. Her shoulders relax as if the doubts of the weeks are floating away from her. But distress covers the young woman’s face almost immediately, and she shakes her head.

“I have to leave.”

Linda listens as Jane tells her why. Two things triggered Jane’s decision to apply for another job. The first was the personal relationship between her and Linda. Not being in touch became increasingly difficult and, conversely, working together again on a day-to-day basis was beginning to frighten her. She knows that she can have no peace of mind. The prospect of seeing Linda or of watching out for her, has come to be a torture to which she can choose not to expose herself. Nor does the prospect appeal of going to the Hebrides on her own for the next dig - Linda has already indicated on one of the E-mails that she will not be going. That, Jane says, would be like walking with the ghost of their time together.

It will be easier not to see Linda but she still wants to stay in the city. And now she reveals the one thing Linda has not dared to hope for. She wants to be here when Linda is free for her. Linda sighs with relief at this news and risks touching Jane’s hand, just for a moment. Jane does not withdraw her hand but does not respond.

Instead, she says that her other reason for leaving the job is a professional one. The Helen Moore article has had a major impact on her. She has been working with her colleagues and seniors with the constant and unanswered question as to whether they really want her to be here. She has embarrassed her colleagues, Linda, her employer. She has sent ripples through the press. She just has the feeling that things are no longer comfortable. It is nothing concrete; nothing she can ask about. And she has absolutely no evidence that anything is wrong - things appear to be going on as normal.

But there is something she had to test. She had to know whether she was employable - professionally wanted - as the person she truly is. She applied for and was given the job here at the University as Doctor Jane Gray and, in the absence of any contrary information, was assumed to be heterosexual. She wanted to see what would happen now if she went for a new job as Jane Gray - self-acknowledged lesbian. It should make no difference. Would it? She discussed it with Nicola and Jacky. Nicola thought that Jane was taking a hammer to crack a nut. Jacky thought that Jane needed to square a circle.

She applied for a senior curator’s post at the City Museum and Art Gallery in mid October, was interviewed and appointed to the post right away. She has a term’s notice to give and will move straight to the new post in the New Year. It is a liberating feeling. Not only is she starting a new job based on her ability but also as who she is. This is what the vast majority of new employees do every week but for someone in Jane’s position it is the first time she has done so.

Linda listens, following the logic of Jane’s thinking and silently rejoicing that Jane will still be here in the city. She does not dare ask whether Jane is staying simply because of her. She might also be staying to be near to Hector who still has his studies to complete.

She has no choice but to accept what Jane says. She is sorely tempted to suggest that they should meet up outside the context of the University but she resists that. She has no right to torture Jane any further. They have their pact. It is best left this way. One day, it will be time to ask her again. Until then, she has no right to interfere in Jane’s life any further.

All she can say is that she understands and that she is glad that Jane will still be close. They leave it at that.

And the next day, Robert Thane says what good news it is for the University that one of their academic colleagues will be in the City Museum. She understands his congratulatory tone to Linda perfectly. The University’ problem - Jane’s presence - has resolved itself. Robert clearly surmises that this was through Linda’s good influence.

CHAPTER 30

In October, Brenda Ramsey is interviewed and charged with a number of counts of wasting police time and of perverting the course of justice. Inspector Philips keeps Susan up to date on the swift chain of events, including the fact that when he interviewed Brenda at her workstation at the Department of Divinity, Brenda’s alert new boss also gave him a folder. This shrewd woman did not like what she found in the folder that was stored in Brenda’s desk and felt, in all the circumstances, that it would be sensible to pass the information to the police. It was a file that Brenda had compiled on Susan and her friends, Linda and Jane.

When she was interviewed, Brenda struggled at first to find an explanation for the Inspector. At first, she stated, she did not think that Dave was having an affair with Susan Blakely but she just wanted to find out about her. The other two women, she quickly established, were Susan’s friends. But she did not see that she had done anything wrong. The Inspector was acid – did Brenda really think that there was nothing unusual in keeping a dossier on people, the same people who then end up the victims of a car attack? Brenda was too weak to stand up to even the slightest of aggressive interviewing. She told the Inspector how she came to believe that the affair did happen and how she felt so betrayed by the two, but mainly by Susan whom she had trusted. She told Inspector Philips everything about setting Dave up, and about how her husband decided to confess to protect her. Brenda’s own confession was easy to extract. On the evening, a couple of weeks before the attack, when Jane accompanied Linda and met Susan, Brenda watched from a corner of the seafood restaurant and saw Jane and Linda holding hands over the table. Then Linda stroked Jane’s face. The place was crowded so it was easy for Brenda to watch without being seen. She had never known any lesbians but she knew what she was seeing. She also knew that Linda worked at the University. She recognised her by sight but at that point in time did not know who she was. She checked the staff records on the computer the next day and she found out who Linda was and then who Jane was. By accessing the records for these reasons, the Inspector told Susan, Brenda has also breached her conditions of employment and the University have yet to decide what action to take. At the moment it is considering taking disciplinary action against their employee.

Brenda’s criminal confession was to being at the scene of the accident, not coming forward and then leading Dave to confess. All this was wasting police time and perverting the course of justice. Inspector Philips did not conceal his pleasure at the number of charges that Brenda faces.

She gave the account, accurate now, of what she witnessed. She described a drunken man who got into and then drove a large car. But she could not describe the make of car other than that it was expensive. She had a good view of what happened on that Friday night.

But what she said differed from the account given by the taxi driver. The Inspector made the point that this often happens when there is more than one witness to the same incident. It looked to Brenda like a straight forward hit and run accident and as if the driver had failed to stop after an accidental hit. The car was a big one. That was all she could see in the dark. The man was obviously drunk. He was tall and dark and on his own. She had watched him come out of a pub and fumble with his keys. He dropped them twice before he managed to get the key into the lock. When he got into the driver’s seat he sat for a while trying to get the key into the ignition - or so it looked to Brenda. From there, it all happened so quickly. She saw the two women emerge and this took her attention away from the car and its drunk driver. Then the car lurched forward and did a kangaroo jump before beginning to pick up speed. It glanced off one of the women - Linda Pilar, Brenda thought, and she saw Susan Blakely fall sideways. That was all. The car tail lights shot away and Brenda decided she needed to get away quickly too.

All this information has given the police the new line of enquiry that it was a random and drunken incident.

Brenda was charged by Inspector Philips and released to the care of her waiting parents.

“What will happen to her, Peter? Will she go to prison?” Susan desperately hopes that she will not. She might have been a damned nuisance but the adverse publicity would get worse for Susan if that happened.

“I doubt it.” Inspector Philips said. “She will have to appear in court and the charges are serious enough. But when the case comes up they will take it in to account that it is a first offence and that it is all tied up with her personal problems. The court will probably ask for reports to be prepared. We’ll have to wait and see.”

“What about Dave?” Susan came in.

“Dave will be fine, I’m sure. There is a police report to the prosecutor, I gather, but we are going to be sympathetic. We are not recommending charges. He is likely to be diverted from prosecution, probably on the proviso that he continues in his psychiatric treatment.”

“Well, that’s good news,” Susan said and she and the Inspector both knew that the reason for her view was nothing to do with Dave Ramsey’s welfare. “I suppose the so-called affair will be used by Brenda’s defence as the reason for lenience?”

“Probably. There’s not much that can be done about that, I’m afraid. One thing I have found out. Brenda is deciding to divorce Dave Ramsey. Her parents took her from the station straight to their home. Apparently, she will go back to her flat just as soon as Dave agrees to move out – and not before. ”

Susan watches in the days following her conversation with Inspector Philips for the press report in the City Tribune about Brenda’s court appearance. All that is reported in that paper is that she was convicted and that a further date was set for reports. There is no mention of Susan’s name.

But Susan has not reckoned on Sarah King. The young journalist from the tabloid does her stuff and another chapter in the Ramsey-Blakely saga hits the front page of the Journal Daily, this time drawing on the defence lawyer’s anticipated plea in mitigation. But Jonathon reassures her that the word of a tabloid is small beer. She should say nothing and ride it out.

Events slow down after this. There is time for her to reflect and for her to realize that it is not, after all, the end of the world. She has survived and she has her job. She might have a dark cloud hanging over her - but she feels that the worst is over.

Life at work settles quickly enough and she has more sympathy than anything else from the people with whom she works. Many of her colleagues think there is something quite praiseworthy in so stoically riding out the storm brewed by the gutter press. She has won something in the estimation of several. Some, though, are embarrassed. Mike Moss enjoys her discomfort – there is no other way to describe his arrogance towards her.

If there is an analogy to describe this time, it is that it is like having an elephant in the room at work. Everyone knows the elephant is there and no one refers to it. But it is a busy office, there are programmes to produce and today’s main gossip soon gives way to other demands and to what is happening in other people’s lives. She knows the focus is off her when the latest events on last night’s programme are once again the main topic of office conversation. And the other main area of gossip in the papers is still rumbling on weeks after the Susan Blakely story has faded - the gay and lesbian accusations that are flying around the University and the city. Susan ducks and weaves when the editorial team want to pick up the story and feature it on ‘Live Tonight’. She finally persuades them to plan what she calls a more measured feature on the impact of new anti discriminatory employment laws. This will take time and by then, she calculates, Linda and Jane will be old news. She does not want to meet her closest friend in the TV studio hot seat.

If Brenda is humiliated at the first court appearance, by the time of the appearance for sentencing she is well briefed by her solicitor to a plea that makes something of a victim of the poor wife who has been so publicly betrayed. She is sorry, too, for what she has done but it was an act born of the deepest distress. It was perhaps an understandable way to behave in the circumstances. In extenuation her solicitor is able to say that her impulsive acts in deceiving the police and leading her husband to confess to a crime he did not committ were unpremeditated - she had no idea at the time of how serious her actions were.

She is placed on probation for one year. The Journal Daily rolls the story again. Susan is named again.

The only good news in all this for Susan is that Brenda does not bother her any further. She and Linda hear through University channels that Brenda manages to keep her job. This does not please Linda but she is not about to make any representations about it. Susan is cited in the divorce papers and she continues to deny any involvement with Ramsey. At the end of the day, it is Ramsey’s word against her. She has little compunction in lying. The Ramsey divorce will still go through whatever she says. The last that Susan hears of Dave Ramsey is a letter from him her thanking her for being instrumental in the forthcoming end of his hopeless marriage. She passes the letter to Inspector Philips, a clever move on her part, she reasons. This is just what someone who was dragged into someone else’s fantasy should do.

Weeks after the car attack, the police still have no idea what line to follow as far as their enquiries are concerned. The case stays open - that is all. And Linda still has no idea who ‘outed’ Jane and her. Neither does Susan.

But life moves on. Susan works hard over these weeks, coming into the public eye as much as possible, driving her interviews with challenging and penetrating interpretation. She spares no one the acerbity of her wit. Attack is a good form of defence against the Sarah Kings of the world. They are small beer by comparison with her standing in the media world. With nothing if not laconic humour, she exposes hypocrisy, double standards and distorted reasoning. She builds quickly on her already significant reputation as a formidable woman to be reckoned with. Her studio audiences still love her. The ratings stay high. She gives a couple of personal interviews to a Sunday magazine, allowing herself to be described as a force to be reckoned with. But she ensures that her profile is of a softer and quieter person when she is away from the job, one who likes peaceful evenings and weekend walks by the sea. The inference is that she is a solitary person and certainly not the type to be seduced by unwanted sexual overtures. If anything, she muses to herself, the glare of publicity has heightened her public profile and cost her little except anxiety. Or so she likes to think.

And she enters a new phase of her life. Alberto is true to his word and returns to the city from Rome, makes contact with her and charms his way back into her life. It is like being courted in traditional style and for several evenings, the two of them eat out and talk and behave as if the earlier sexual encounter did not happen. He woos her, there is no other way to describe it, and the rage that she saw in him on that evening at the hotel is, somehow, dissipated. He does not ask to sleep with her and neither does she offer. They finally talk about the way that they met and how they each behaved. He wants her to know that he regrets that very much. He was keen to see her again; he tried to contact her and then was in the city when the accident happened. He could not stay away from the hospital. He knew that she had a fiancée, but he wanted to have a chance to spend time with her before she finally married.

It is not until this conversation happens that she tells him that the relationship with Bill has ended. He sits and looks at her, waiting for more information. All she says is that it did not work out. She leaves him to draw his own conclusions, dismissing her time with Bill as ‘not right for her’. She laughingly tells him about how Bill returned her clothes from his flat to hers, all neatly folded and tidily dispatched by courier. That is not her type of man.

Alberto smiles and agrees that he can see that. They make love that night at her flat and she finds herself entering a new, mutual sexual experience with him, one that leaves her wanting more. She is in a new relationship, for the first time with someone who started out as an anonymous sexual encounter. It is a good feeling as if, without much being said, she is with someone who understands.

She tells Linda of course, but there is an almost imperceptible distance between them now. There is less of the ‘me thou’ communication between them at the moment. They are certainly exchanging information about their lives and about the events that are unfolding for each of them because of the publicity and the accident. But Susan is aware of a lack of closeness. For her part, she knows that her life is moving on and that she is letting that happen quickly as an antidote to stopping to think too much. Linda is the more reflective of the two of them and more wanting to dwell and focus on what happened. This is not Susan’s way and she feels, on any occasion when that kind of conversation happens between her and Linda that she wants it to finish. If she is honest with herself, she knows that she is also still guilty about the accident and believes that somehow it will still turn out to be connected to Dave Ramsey. She finds it hard to face the sense of responsibility that therefore carries for Linda’s injuries. And the exposure of the lesbian friendship might well never have happened but for the accident. But that is a thought that she dismisses. It was too big to contemplate.

But they keep in touch, Linda and she, and she senses that Linda wants the friendship to continue but needs some space herself. Susan supposes her recounting of her sexual aberrations and the fallout from them will have put quite a strain on Linda. Linda has been a stalwart but has quite enough on her plate in her sexual and emotional crisis over Jane without Susan’s crises coming at the same time.

And apart from anything else, Susan’s energies are focussed on Alberto. That, by definition leaves less time for Linda. She hears nothing of Bill until the programme producer suggests a live review of the new legal system of solicitor-advocates, the system that is the focus of Bill’s developing career. She agrees, pleased to have the chance to interview Bill and to have a moment of power over him. To her surprise, she hears via her TV team that he and other leading members of the legal profession agree that they will appear.

She rings him. Will he have a coffee with her before they meet in the context of the programme and the TV Studio? Of equal surprise to her is the fact that he accepts her invitation.

She looks at him when he comes into the coffee house, carrying another grip of small possessions she left at his flat. She feels nothing except a sense of sadness for something gone and something near to pity for the tidiness of the man. If this had been Alberto, the clothes and toiletries would have been put in the bin, she is sure of that.

She soon understands that he is here to have his say, to clear the air and to set his stall out for the programme to come. Bill knows the power of the press only too well and he is quite upfront with her – he wants the programme to go well in the interests of his profession and without their previous relationship getting in the way.

He is cool and serious and there is no hint from him of any regret for the relationship they have left behind. If anything, there is a degree of anger towards her and distrust as to the nature of the programme that she and the producer are envisaging. His primary concerns are his reputation and his future and he talks openly about this.

He is bitter about his loss of reputation. His act of generosity in agreeing to front the TV appeal for the car attacker to come forward cost him a serious dent in his reputation. This gave confirmation in the public domain that he was indeed involved with this woman Susan Blakely who ended up at the centre of the ‘sex romp’ scandal. Without that TV appearance, it would have been open to speculation as to whether there was any truth in the Journal Daily article that he was associated with her. Only the few who knew of his relationship with Susan would have realized the full implications. Only those few would have come to know that he had quietly ended the engagement. As it was, although there has been no further reference to him in the press, he has had another couple of journalists try to reach him. He did not lift the phone to them.

And, he tells her coldly, in the legal circles in which he moves, his reputation is now tarnished. It is a guilty by association problem at two levels. Just knowing someone who is the object of public criticism is raising eyebrows. And there will undoubtedly be ribald comments behind his back, based on a similar type of sexual encounter between him and Susan as was described between her and Ramsey. The words of the article still haunt him - ‘lurid and kinky’ He sees his career and the success of the firm Nicolson and Berry about to be put to the test. She owes him – that is the clear message.

Sitting over coffee, Susan watches the man whom she so recently thought she would marry describe to her the end of their relationship from his perspective. Without the existence of Alberto, this might have been difficult for her. Hearing that

Bill’s reaction to Susan’s visit to his office that day was exactly how he felt still stings, even after all this time. That day he felt that he never wanted to see her again. He had to admit to himself that it gave him some pleasure to watch the shock on her face as he made himself clear that it was over between them. Susan does not give him the satisfaction of knowing how devastated she was that day. She just sits there and shrugs slightly, silently remembering her tears by the sea.

But she cannot conceal her look of shock when he announces that his sole purpose in agreeing to the TV programme is to issue a challenge to her in the public domain not to interfere with his new responsibilities in taking forward the solicitor-advocate role. He really has entered the lion’s den to kill any residual damage she might be contemplating. Now he tells her with barely concealed delight – he is also announcing his engagement. He met her at a dinner party - a junior teacher called Kate, the daughter of one of the surgeons at the hospital and his music teacher wife. Kate’s main interests are horses and golf. Before meeting Bill, she spent most weekends at the country house with ‘Mummy and Daddy’. He dated her for a few weeks, and has just asked her to marry him. She said yes.

“Are you in love with her, Bill?” she asks, setting aside a sardonic comment about the eminent suitability of the match for social climbers like Bill.

But she enjoys the moment. It is Susan’s turn to gloat. He cannot reply. Instead, he talks about how happy they are. And when is the big day to be, she asks, letting her tone of cynicism pervade the question. It will be in about a month’s time.

“Careful, Bill,” she augurs, “Or there will be talk that it’s a shotgun wedding.”

He gives her a withering look. They will honeymoon in Portugal after a wedding ceremony in the city Cathedral. They intend to tour and to stay in paradores – neither of them likes beach holidays. He rubs it in, wanting to see Susan’s reaction. If she does react to anything it is privately to the fact that Bill talking in terms of ‘we’ is grating on her. She needs to court more indifference herself. Perhaps it was a mistake to be seeing him and to be contemplating this programme.

But she turns the talk back to the business of all that, seeing her opportunity to toy with Bill as she does so, Bill returns to the subject of the programme and the issues as far as he and the QC are concerned.

Jeremy Parkhurst advised Bill that there was now a slow groundswell of opinion amongst advocates that the clear division between solicitors and themselves within the justice system should be changed. To hold on to that groundswell, the changes need to be brought in slowly, and without any rush that could tip opinion in the opposite direction. The government is anticipating a successful election, and that they will be returned. It will then progress the proposals into legislation during the next term.

And Susan can help or hinder that. And she can help or hinder his career. Whether she will, she has yet to decide.

But she leaves him with the clear impression that it will be a balanced, straight forward debate and that everyone, Bill included, will have opportunity to put their arguments forward. And it will be strictly professional, she tells him, eyeing him closely.

She holds the power here, and she knows it. But she has connected with some feelings of her own for this man who could have become her husband and she has a shrewd suspicion that he still feels strongly about her. She is inscrutable, though. She has no desire to rekindle anything between them. It is over and she has Alberto. She leaves him outside the coffee house, an intimate stranger to her, no more than that.

As these thoughts pass through her head, she turns her mind almost immediately to the taxi drive to the airport and her scheduled flight to Rome, where she will spend a long weekend with Alberto - a much more fascinating lover and companion. She will be her own best judge about how to handle the programme nearer the time.

Just as she is about to turn and hail a taxi, Bill seems to think of something else to say. She waits, conscious that she is now running tight for time if she is to clear the afternoon build-up of traffic and to make her flight in comfort. He looks at her and for a second, it is the look of Bill who had once loved her.

“Did you ever love me, Susan?”

She hesitates but comes close up to him.

“Yes, Bill. I did. In my way.”

They kiss, the kiss of fond sadness. And then she is on her way.

CHAPTER 31

The issue of how to do something purposeful with this time in her life is at the fore of Linda’s thinking. There is a vacuum that she has to fill. She wonders whether she might either do something political or in the line of social support, based on the experiences that she has just had. Jane’s article was a good model of how one could behave in circumstances like this. Is Linda such a coward that she will do nothing positive herself? There must be women in thousands, if not in hundreds of thousands, if the issue were looked at internationally, who have experienced the same struggle to come to terms with their sexuality. There have to be thousands who face secrecy or discrimination in employment and who face stigmatisation by families and society. The embryo of an idea begins to develop but as yet it is no more than that. Susan has said to her that she wonders what trouble Linda will get herself into next and, even though it was said jokingly, Linda agrees to think carefully and to let her ideas evolve slowly. What Linda does know, though, is that she was going to do something.

She decides on a literature search on the subject of sexuality and employment and on what other women have already written about the same aspects of adjustment to sexual orientation as those with which she has so recently struggled.

She needs to do something productive. She believes that her beginning thoughts about political action are sound. She calls it creating political community. She knows that she is not interested in community in the way that others are - living in a sub-culture of exclusively homosexual people. She would not ever want to live in what she sees as an enclave of homes exclusive to lesbians. No, her sense of political community is more a conceptual one, her concerns more about the diversity of women’s lives within the societies in which they live. Women living as Jane does, or as indeed she now does herself, need a sense of self-identity, a sense of community with like-minded women. They also need rights - human rights, the right to be recognized in every sense. For Linda, it is a question of exploring the sameness of her personal and social experience with all other women as well as the difference of being a lesbian woman within mainstream society.

Her ideas shape into a proposal to seek out other women’s views - is there an inability in society to reconcile the sameness and the difference - does a woman have to be either in society and therefore perceived as ‘normal’ or excluded even, if in the subtlest of ways, because she is a lesbian?

She toys with the idea of developing a research proposal. After all, her research skills would make the task easy enough. The ideas might be flowing, but Linda determines to move slowly as she is not intending to invent wheels that already exist or to run headlong into a cause that can go nowhere But she is a well-trained academic and she can and maybe should use that training wisely. What the University will make of it is another matter and she knows that if she is going to pursue this, it will be outside her terms of employment. She might look to another institution to sponsor her research.

They are thoughts and they might stay as no more than that but they comfort Linda and help her to tolerate the mould back into the roles of Professor, wife and mother. There has to be something different for her out of all this. Going back to the Linda Pilar of a few months ago is simply not an option.

Her birthday approaches. The day comes and goes. There is nothing personal from Jane though - just ‘best wishes’ on an anodyne card.

And this was how the term progresses. She sees Jane at meetings and in the coffee lounge as she walks slowly along the corridor with the help of her stick. Linda is politeness itself but that is all. The rapport that accompanied their earlier working time together is also gone. Linda ensures that she remains the model of correctness, and if Jane is frustrated by this, she contains that frustration. Linda’s upset that Jane was moving jobs soon changes to ambivalence. Life at work is becoming intolerable -beyond Linda’s expectations. She concludes that she wants Jane to leave whilst she still loves her and before she becomes angry or even hateful. Jane’s acquired apparent indifference is hurtful in a way she has not experienced before, especially when it takes the form of spending her leisure time around the campus facilities with the ever present Hector.

Eventually, the day dawns of Jane’s departure from the University. It is also the last day of term. It falls to Linda to make the farewell speech and the presentation of the crystal glasses for which the staff have collected. Linda’s is a correct but fulsome speech, focussing on the good work that Jane has done, the contribution she has made to the research programme and her well-deserved popularity with colleagues and students. Jane is not going far, of course, and there are already strong links between the University and the City Museum; that long and profitable link will undoubtedly be strengthened by Jane’s continuing contribution from the different discipline. She thanks Jane to the affectionate applause of her colleagues, presents her with the box of glasses and as she does so, shakes her hand and kisses her cheek. Linda’s lips barely touch the other woman’s skin.

Jane responds, even if she is a little choked with emotion. That, Linda assumes, will be attributed by those present to the fact that she is sad to be leaving. Their colleagues cover any awkwardness with genuine and loud applause. Anyway, American colleagues are always more expressive. Wine and nibbles are on offer and the party mingles for another half hour before people start to drift away to start their vacations. Linda stays till the end, still following the protocol of what the most senior person present should do. She says her goodbyes to Jane with a final word of good wishes.

That is it. If there is any personal message to her from Jane, Linda does not see it. Hector is at Jane’s side and stays there as Jane waits till the last of her colleagues trickle away. He puts another glass of wine in front of her and sits with her, just being there.

“Come on,” he says as their glasses head towards empty. “We can’t have you going off to that flat on your own on this of all nights. Let’s eat.”

Linda stands and watches as Jane and Hector leave, Jane turning for one last smile in her direction. It is over and that void is there in front of Linda once again.

In the evening, Linda sits alone in the study, working quietly at a paper she is writing for submission to an archaeological journal. The children are out at youth activities, Ken is in late surgery and she is free to let her tears course down her cheeks, blurring the computer screen. Tina comes in, catching her unawares

“I know, Linda.”

She looks at Tina.

“I worked it out for myself. This is the day that Jane left the University, isn’t it?”

“I’m sorry, Tina. The children - I don’t want to cause them any pain.”

Tina looks at her.

“It’s not for you to apologise.” Then she says the one thing that matters, that tells Linda that Tina has no judgement to make.

“These things happen. It’s just a question of looking after the little ones.”

“Thank you, Tina.” She takes Tina’s hand in one of their rare moment of physical closeness and squeezes it.

She sits on her own for a while after Tina leaves to make some coffee. She is a very unlikely source of comfort, is Tina, but all the more precious for that. The older woman comes back just ten minutes later and, sensing that Linda wants her company, sits on the edge of the armchair in the room.

“You know, what I still don’t see in all this is how the press got a hold of the story about you in the first place.” Tina sips her coffee as she says this, watching Linda’s face for her reaction.

Linda knows that it is still an unsolved mystery. She just has not allowed herself to dwell on the question. But now she takes the article from the drawer and reads it again with Tina sitting beside her. For all that these few words have caused so much havoc in her life, she has only read it on the day it was published, not since. Sarah King certainly did a sensational article; one which mirrored her style on the ‘Sex Romp’ article about Susan. The spin she chose under this strap line - ‘University of Lesbianism’, was about significant numbers of lesbians and gays in the city’s University staff group in relationships with other staff, and with students.

Jane and Linda are named, the proof of their relationship being provided by the sighting of them in a particular Italian restaurant. A colleague of theirs saw them, according to the article, holding hands and behaving intimately. Other names were printed, mainly lecturers, but Linda is the most senior person mentioned.

The words ‘lesbian’ and ‘dyke’ are both used but only in general terms and references to themselves as ‘believed to be partners’ were not, in themselves, pejorative.

“It could have been any one of hundreds of people,” she says now to Tina, “If it was in fact someone from the University.”

Then it clicks. Linda just stares at Tina. Brenda Ramsey. Susan told Linda about the confession to the police and about the file that Brenda kept on them. Of course. It had to be her. Why has she not thought this through before? It is obvious now. She did just not realize before because she did not read the article again for all these weeks. And she only half listened to that part of Susan’s account of her talk with Inspector Philips.

She tells Tina. Tina knows the name - there has been enough publicity over that woman and the Susan situation in the press in recent weeks. Tina is as heated as Linda has ever seen the otherwise tranquil personality. What she would like to do to that young woman is not fit to be said out loud. Linda just smiles. At least she understands now. And she hazards a guess that Brenda would have been paid, and paid handsomely, for her account to the press. Linda wonders what embellishments the woman put on the story. And she can certainly remember touching Jane’s hand and face in the restaurant. That was true. She just did not think for one second that anyone else was so interested in their table as to be watching. They were only momentary touches but they happened. And she cannot honestly say that she regrets it - for all that that evening has cost them.

As she sits here, Tina’s presence a reassuring comfort, she thinks about some of the more recent exchanges between Ken and herself. The previous evening, he found some of her jottings from her computer search on lesbian women. He was livid as he confronted her and as she confirmed some of the political views that were so obviously in her mind.

“It’s not so bad, Ken” she muttered, irritated by his demeanour.

“Not so bad?” he exploded. “How do you think I feel having my wife” - he almost spat the words out - “My wife paraded in front of the public like this? And my wife is now thinking of getting herself further into all this deviant nonsense. What sort of a bloody wimp does this make me look like?”

She saw what he meant but signalled, exasperated, that she dismissed the effect on him. Her concern was with the children - not the preservation of his ego.

“You’ll survive, Ken. There are plenty of bisexual women in the world living in marriages.” She felt, and sounded, scathing.

“Bloody Dyke,” Ken roared.

They stopped there as Angela came in, just awakened by the row, and still warm from sleep.

“Hello, Darling,” Linda said, putting her arms out.

“What’s a dyke, Mummy?”

“It’s just a word for people like me who have special friends, Angie. People use it sometimes if they want to be unkind.” She glared at Ken.

“Are you Jane’s partner?”
That was the hardest question.

“No, Darling. I was. But it was a little while ago.”

“Oh,” was all Angela said, then, “Jane’s nice.”

Ken got up, said, “Back to bed, Angie.”

Linda opens up now with Tina, telling her about the children.

Angela is going to be OK. Linda knows it. But she is seriously worried about Kenny. Something makes her sense that she cannot go to him as she would do in other circumstances. This time she has to wait for him to come to her. And she has to trust that Ken will do what he can to help Kenny. She is also glad that the article by Helen Moore appeared to go down well with Kenny. She gathered that was true, not from what he said, but by the fact that he did not comment and seemed more at ease after it appeared. She saw him reading it intently and quietly on the day it appeared.

Linda knows that it was a sound article, confronting bigoted attitudes and basically saying that Jane Gray was a bright mature academic who happened to be gay and who could comment critically on the experience of women in similar circumstances from an international perspective. It was the educated journalistic demand for tolerance that lifted the article and brought some dignity to Jane’s situation and, by inference, to her own.

Tina read all the papers at the time, quietly and on her own. Her advice to Linda is simple – she should wait. The children will come to her.

And she is right. It is several days before Kenny comes to her but he does come. It is a Saturday in fact, when Ken is at morning surgery and Tina and Angela are out doing the food shop for the weekend. It is safe for him to come in without losing too much face. She plays down the gap in time since she has talked with her son.

“Hi, Kenny,” she sys with a gentle smile of welcome, putting down the morning paper.

He hovers and gives a gruff ‘Hi’ in return. She breaks the impasse.

“I love you, Kenny.”

“I love you too, Mum.”

He comes over and it is a young Kenny who hugs her and then cries for a while in his mother’s arms.

It comes out slowly. Dad has said that Jane is not going to be about ever again. Is that right? She says, “Yes”, aware of her betrayal of her own feelings as she does so. The school has talked to him about the paper. Linda thinks it must have been the school counsellor. It has been explained to him that it is not the terrible thing to be a lesbian or a gay person that the papers and others make out. It is just the way some people are. His mates have not teased him. If anything, they have been very matter of fact about it all. But it was Angela more than anyone who affected him. She came into his room and just said that Mum was sad and she left again. He knows that he has been a big part of that sadness.

It is a quiet morning, one that they spend together and she talks about emotions and feelings that people can have for someone of their own sex. They are not bad or wrong. Kenny grows up this morning and makes a fundamental adjustment. He does not understand and he asks no questions about the sexual aspects. But he loves his mother. She is still the same person. When they get to that point, Linda knows that the work is done as far as it can be for now. When Ken and the two shoppers arrive home, Kenny is once again in his room but this time the door is open and music is issuing forth. Ken gives Linda an enquiring look and she nods with a sense of triumph over her husband that things are better. Tina simply gives her a smile and Linda says to her,

“You were right.”

Flashbacks from the accident recede as her sleeping pattern returns to normal and as other events dominate her thinking. But they come back again when the news breaks that Dave Ramsey has been released after being interviewed.

If he is not responsible for the attack, then who is? It is an uncomfortable, unanswered question, one that she shares with Susan. But Susan is increasingly less interested in all that. Susan has the ability to move forwards, Linda realizes, faster than she can. Mind you, Susan has someone new in her life - that must be a great incentive to forget the events of the summer. She wonders in her private thoughts about Susan and whether she will now finally settle down. She hopes so, for her friend’s sake. But she doubts it.

She feels very ambiguous about her friend, and it is a friendship that she no longer thinks of as special. Too much has happened to tarnish that. Somewhere her respect for Susan has gone; not so much because of the sexual aberration she has told Linda about; more because of the hard indifference of emotion that Susan is so capable of.She would ideally have seen more of Susan at this time, if only to say some of this, albeit in more neutral terms. But Susan is busy and Ken never lets her name come up without some cryptic remark. It is a line of least resistance, she knows, but it is getting easier to just bow to his will and allow a growing distance from Susan.

The climate between her and Ken remains very cool, since neither of them wants to spend very much time with the other except to maintain a front for the children. Things are changing in intangible ways and Linda knows that everyone in the household senses it. Tina is better than all of them at holding things together but the children, consciously or otherwise, become too good in their behaviour to really be themselves. There is a kind of heightened awareness about keeping things as normal as they were before. Because of that, life in the Pilar household takes on an artificiality. It is almost imperceptible but it is there all right.

Their social life is negligible. And the prospect of Christmas this year is a daunting one. She and Tina work out the practicalities of presents and catering. The children have spurted in height over the year and both need new bikes. That makes present decisions for them easy. She orders by phone for the rest from one of the main department stores on the high street - casual clothes for Ken, candles and vases for friends, a brooch for Susan. Tina finds nice cards and wrapping papers and obviously knows Linda’s tastes well. The two prepare the shopping list for the Christmas family catering and it is agreed that Tina will see to most of it. The family will collect and decorate the tree on the Saturday before Christmas. Linda hopes that Tina will be with them for Christmas, as a means of diluting the inevitable tension that Linda imagines will prevail, but an ailing sister is taking priority. She will be back for New Year.

So it is to be just the four of them, and Linda is not happy with the prospect of Tina’s absence. Somehow, she has been the sticking plaster over the family wound.

Ken arrives home late from the surgery on Christmas Eve. The children are full up with pre-Christmas excitement but Ken is fractious at the surgery having gone on so late. Linda’s efforts at mulled wine and canapés go without thanks. She is tired too but they both keep up some sort of front till the children go to their rooms to watch TV - there is no point in asking them to get a good night’s sleep.

It comes to time to put the presents out and for the first time since the accident and the newspaper article, Ken and Linda are alone, face-to-face in what should be a happy and intimate time, like every other Eve of Christmas. It is not. As they stolidly put out presents and Ken brings in the bikes from the garage, Linda puts everyone’s presents in their traditionally allotted place under the tree. There is nothing from Ken to her.

She asks him when he comes in - after all, the next day should be the same for the children as every other year.

“Ken, that’s all the presents out - except yours to me?”

He looks at her, mild pleasure, she thinks, in his eyes.

“I did not buy you one, Linda.”

“Great. Just great. That’s going to look good in front of the kids. I thought we were going to go on as normal?”

She should not have used that word.

“Normal? How can you talk to me about normal? These last weeks and months and weeks have been a travesty, thanks to you and your abnormal behaviour.” He emphasises the word ‘abnormal’.

She needs to keep her cool but she can’t. Too many weeks of tiptoeing around his judgmental silence have passed for that.

“You bastard, Ken. It happened. OK? You wanted this family to go on. I’m trying. You make it a charade.”

It goes on. And on. Without too much attention to the fact that they are still drinking the wine, they rail at each other, hurling accusation and insult back and forth, stripping away what is left of their relationship down to its bones. It only ends when neither of them can think of anything else damaging to say. They sleep in the same bed, each one utterly alone.

Despite the alcohol and the distress, Linda sleeps well that night and wakes only once to the knowledge that something major has happened. She goes over to sleep again and wakes at eight on Christmas morning. She can hear the voices of the children, deliberately waking her and Ken and urging them on to the traditional family descent to the sitting room below.

Ken emerges from sleep, apparently in a better frame of mind and both parents hug the children and made a show of wishing each other a happy day. There is no eye contact. They descend, Kenny too grown up after his recent fifteenth birthday to show much excitement but Angela still chattering and unaware that anything is wrong.

The room looks good - filled with colour, boxes and bikes. The hour of drinking coffee and opening presents passes quickly enough. The tradition of watching each family member’s gifts to the others follows its usual pattern. Kenny has golfing accessories for his father, perfume for Linda. Angela has a hat for fishing for Ken, gloves in the right size for her mother. And so on. Linda duly gives Ken his casual clothes and accepts his peck on the cheek. Then, of course, there is a silence as it dawns on Kenny and then on Angela that there is a present missing. Linda is about to say something about Ken being caught up in the surgery on Christmas Eve but Ken puts his hand into his dressing gown pocket, pulls out an envelope and passes it to Linda, saying,

“This was for you.”

She notes the past tense. She opens it. It is a photograph of a car, a people carrier. He has bought her a new car.

“It’s in the garage.”

“Oh. Ken.”

The children think that she is overwhelmed. They shoot off to see the car for themselves. She is not overwhelmed. She is angry, angry with herself. But she contains it. This is Christmas morning.

“Ken. I’m sorry.”

“Forget it. It was a foolish idea, anyway.” He leaves the room to go into the kitchen. She smells bacon cooking. They always have bacon on Christmas morning.

They both know that the argument would have happened somehow and at some point. But that does not ease Linda’s guilt or Ken’s black mood. They get through the day as best they can. The kids put their bikes on the bike rack behind the people carrier and they all head into the country to find a cycle track. Ken cycles on his bike with the children and Linda sits in the car, morose in the silence of the grey afternoon light. They cook the turkey, eat it in the late afternoon and phone the grandparents in Spain. Linda speaks to her brother, Danny, and even over the phone and after all the years since she last saw him, Danny knows that things are not right. But she passes it off and Danny just encourages her to think about a family trip out to Canada to see him. The whole Pilar family are too too tired and the adults too jaded, to do more than watch television in the evening.

Late on Boxing Day morning, the kids are off again on their bikes to show them to friends and to compare presents. Linda is in the sitting room making some effort to tidy the room of presents when Ken appears with a tray of coffee. She knows that he wants to talk and she sits down, wanting to clear the air but afraid of another row.

“I want a divorce, Linda.” It is said as baldly as that.

Her two silent reactions after the immediate shock are, “Fine,” and “What about the kids?” She does not have time to say anything, before Ken goes on.

“And I want the children with me.”

She is furious.

“I want. I want. It’s not as simple as that, Ken, and you know it. You’ll get your divorce but over my dead body do you just walk off with my children. What they want matters, Ken, and making sure that they do not lose their childhood out of all this matters too.”

“I’m not having them in any lesbian relationship, Linda and I’ll fight you tooth and nail over that.”

“That’s not for you to say, Ken. Kids have a say these days.” She is stabbing in the dark but she sees Ken back off. “Anyway, I’m not in a lesbian relationship, thanks to you.” She pauses before going on more calmly, “How we go about this matters as much as how it all pans out. So the sooner we stop rowing and start thinking about the children again, the sooner we can start to sort all this out.

She changes tack.

“I take it this is over the row the other night?”

She knows that she is going to make a last effort to hold the marriage together. Christmas is a bad time for making life-changing decisions. They should both cool down. But Ken is clear, if not adamant.

“Not at all. I’ve been thinking about this for some time. I suppose Christmas was my last stab at going on together but it’s over Linda. I actually don’t love you any more. And I need to make a life for me now while I still have time.”
Linda begins to feel the first pain and the grief for a relationship and a marriage that is over. But she puts those feelings away - she will deal with her own sadness later.

“What are you going to do?” It is like talking with a stranger.

“I haven’t decided yet. It depends on the children.”

She sits for a few minutes, sipping the coffee and gathering her thoughts. This is no time for them to be squabbling like infants.

“Let’s agree on one thing, Ken. We must present a united front to the children about this. They are going to feel that it’s the end of the world for a while. They’ve got to know that we still love them and that we both still want them. Ken,” she has a new thought, “Would you consider joint custody and letting them choose where they live, maybe term times with one of us and holidays with the other. Or, they could have weeks and weekends, although that’s not a very settled existence. But you see what I’m getting at?”

She watches as Ken starts to protest and cuts across him.

“Think about this, Ken No matter what we want, they need both of us. They need to know that we are not in conflict over this and that we want what’s best for them. They need their childhoods, Ken - the one thing I said they would have.”

He is still not sure.

“What about that lesbian, Jane Gray?”

“What about her, Ken? What about any battle-axe of a stepmother that you might introduce? Should I have the right to vet and veto too? Because that’s what you are saying to me, Ken.”

“Different, Linda, and you know it.”

“It’s not different, Ken, and you know it.”

They are descending again towards another row and both of them pull back just in time. They stop there, agree to say nothing to the children yet and agree that they will tell them together once they have worked out suggestions to put to them. They will get through the rest of Christmas as best they can. They will speak about it again before the end of the holiday.

It is over. Linda takes days to adjust to the fact that it is Ken and not she who is ending the marriage. But she is not going to stop him. She has had her freedom imposed on her. She will take it. She might well be afraid of facing the vacuum of living outside her marriage but she will face it, none-the-less.

She also faces the fact that the children will survive. They are resilient - all children are. It is a matter now of doing the best by them in the circumstances. They need to work it out as a family - the solicitors should only come in after they have done that.

She thinks of Jane. The way is not clear yet and she does not delude herself. She has to keep thoughts of Jane out of the equation. Anyway, it seems to be Jane and Hector now. She has to put the children first. If Jane and she can be together in the longer term, wonderful. If not, she will have her career.

She talks with Ken again on New Year’s Eve before they collect Tina from the station. She gets the impression that he might have spoken to a solicitor - she cannot be sure. She asks him. They row. He has seen Bill Nicolson, if she must know. He becomes more amenable and calmer, as if following advice given by their erstwhile friend. And he has his own bolt from the blue, in terms of his plans and how they will affect the children. He wants to move out to Spain and to take up a lecturer’s post at the University of the North of Spain in Santander. His currency in practice, his ability with the language and his experience of lecturing make him an attractive proposition to the institution.

So, by definition, the children’s options are closing.

They agree to tell the children the following day, once they have alerted Tina and whilst the family is still on holiday and together.

The children cannot grasp it at first. They were told, just weeks ago, that they were all staying together as a family and now this. Kenny’s first thought is that they have lied to him. It takes Ken’s, rather than Linda’s, assurances that it was Ken who finally decided that he wanted to separate. It will take years for the children to really grasp why their parents want to divorce.

Linda and Ken assure the children that they would both like to have them with them. Since that is not possible, they want them all to work out together how they will live. It is a fine balance between continuing some sense of family and being clear that this is final in terms of their parents’ marriage.

Ken tells them about his provisional plans to go out to Spain to live and work. Both children become excited at the thought of living abroad till they realize that that would mean not being near to Linda.

There is no best solution. The family, which they are losing, was the single best solution for the children.

It takes days for them to come to the decision. But the two youngsters do it together. They would like to live with their mother during term times and with their father in Spain during holidays. Kenny and Angela both insist that they two must be together - there is no question of one child going to one parent, the other to the other. Ken agrees to this. Linda and the children will keep the family home. The couple see the family solicitor and then all the family see the solicitor. Angela celebrates her thirteenth birthday. She and Kenny grow up this holiday. Somewhere in the background Tina probably plays her part, but she never does say anything to Linda.

Linda’s preparation to return to work is, if anything, a welcome relief from home life. She cannot think about it any more. She has nursed and supported her children, nudged Ken along and licked her own emotional wounds for long enough.

Her career is intact. She has survived. Nothing more is said about her and Jane. She will say nothing at work about the divorce. All that can wait.

She loves her children. What she feels for Jane is a quite different form of love. It makes her ache. It is hard not to give any signal in that time - not to ring her even, but if she says anything she would be reopening the friendship and would have to tell Jane about the divorce. She is not going to do that. If Jane is waiting for her by transferring jobs in the city she will wait still. If she has someone else, Hector probably, there is nothing Linda can do about it.

Once a couple make the decision to separate the strain can become intolerable. Ken moves out within a fortnight of Christmas day and they both know that, this way, they can at least both go on being civil to each other. If another few weeks went by that might not be possible. It looks to Linda as though Ken has been planning the move to Spain for some time. His appointment means that he will go out to Spain in the Spring. The family make their adjustments. The children will spend Easter and then the whole of July and August with Ken and their grandparents.

They agree that Linda will buy Ken out of the house. Both of them will share the expense of continuing to employ Tina, who agrees to move with the children as they move between countries. This way, the children will be protected from another loss - that of one of their almost life-long carers. Linda contains her jealousy at the thought of Tina having the children in her absence. Tina will look out for them and protect them. She will remember their little likes and dislikes, their idiosyncrasies, in the way that no man ever could. For now and for another few months, the children are mainly with Linda, Ken coming and going to be with them whenever he wants. These are precious, poignant times.

CHAPTER 32

‘Live Tonight’ runs over the course of the winter with Susan fronting most of the fifteen programmes. It is unquestionably a sound series and Susan puts all her energies into turning out high quality journalistic commentary. The unique combination of the chat show format and the subject matter of political and moral issues of the day bring serious matters to a wide audience. Her TV audience of intelligent people with lay opinions is becoming a stronger and stronger force to be reckoned with. If her studio audience vote at the end of a show in a particular direction, then there are implications for someone somewhere in high echelons.

The watching public like it and the establishment fear it. But as far as her personal adverse publicity is concerned, the tabloids continue to chip away at her dented reputation. The press has no new material to go on but she only has to appear in the papers and there is some allusion to the Sex Romp Presenter. It might be selling papers but it is giving the TV Company a serious problem for the future. Her work might be of the first order but her sullied reputation is not going to go away.

She has support from her colleagues - the team and Jonathon Whitney in particular. She hardly moves amongst angels in terms of the lifestyles of her colleagues and, anyway, these people know how to separate the professional and the personal and just get on with the work. She has a sense that her higher bosses are jangled by the continuing tabloid attention, although Jonathon never admits as much. Susan has a far harder time from the press in the longer term than Linda and Jane have. Linda and Jane might well be last year’s news but Susan’s celebrity status means that she is not yet out of the woods as far as negative press publicity is concerned.

Behind the scenes she does everything she can to keep her serious profile to the forefront of influential minds. She rings journalists and reporters whom she has met over the years and she lunches with the wise and the good of business and public life - there are still plenty of people who have not fallen victim to her journalistic scrutiny. She attends conferences and sits through interminable conference dinners, presenting the serious and balanced face of journalism. She plays the well-known card – “you can trust me. I may be tough but I’m fair.”

In all this she keeps her sex life completely private. She is determined that the press will have nothing other than Dave to go on and that has now all but played itself out as far as Brenda’s criminal case is concerned. She is pretty certain that they will not find out anything else about her past. And she gives them no opportunity to find out anything about the present by guarding Alberto from scrutiny, something with which he is more than happy to oblige.

The invitations for other sexual liaisons come, of course. There is no easier way to find quick sex if you are a professional than at a residential conference. And if you are Susan Blakely with a reputation waiting to be tested by any interested and testosterone-driven conference delegate you have your work cut out. But Susan knows better than to fall for that, for now at least. She drills herself to remain ‘on duty’ at all times and she avoids too much alcohol. She also stays in mixed company in the bars. She plays the model of propriety, working endlessly to downplay the image that the tabloids have given her.

It is not a question of having reformed. She is occasionally tempted and indeed wants to have several sexual encounters over the weeks. But something new is happening in her relationship with Alberto and she is content to let that take its course. Alberto is proving to be a very interesting and balanced person.

One of the things she is waiting for before she can feel completely safe and free again is the continuation of her contract with the TV Company. She spends the period up to Christmas absorbed in the programme and in consolidating her reputation. It is after Christmas before it really dawns on her that the contract will end in the spring when the TV programmes will shift to summer viewing. ‘Live Tonight’ is finishing. No one is saying anything to her about a summer and early autumn series, not even Jonathon Whitney. She waits and she watches. And she listens. But it is too early to start asking questions or to start looking elsewhere. She is worried. It would be pretty damning if either a successful series like ‘Live Tonight’ did not run for a further round or the Company did not give her some plum new job. Her currency would drop. She wonders if she is looking the end of her career in the eyes. It is a long slow winter.

She sees Linda often enough and still draws some comfort from the mutual support of that friendship. She watches Linda’s slow recovery and she saw before the Pilars themselves did that the marriage could not, and should not, survive. It had become an unhealthy place for Linda and it could only become an unhealthy place for the kids. And her opinion of Ken diminishes. She liked him once but she came to hate him for his silent, surly punishment of Linda and his use of the kids to get at her. She has no qualms about saying to Linda that she should divorce him. When Ken told Linda that he was divorcing her and after the children’s future was settled, Susan was relieved for her friend.

She keeps in touch for lunches with Jane and she gives Jane every encouragement to hold on. She does not tell Jane about the pending divorce – that would be interference, she concludes. But she more than encourages Linda that when the time is right she should contact Jane. Susan presumes that Jane is still waiting, even if Linda does fear this Hector chap. As far as Susan is concerned, what does it matter if Jane is having a fling with Hector? Surely, she argues to Linda, she could not expect the woman to just sit at home and knit? Linda keeps her own counsel but Susan knows that what she said to her did not fall on deaf ears. She emphasises what she says - she is sure in her own mind that Linda should go to Jane when the time is right.

She likes Jane more and more and although she will never understand two women’s sexual relationship - what could they do? - she can quite see, sense even, the emotional tie that exists between the two. They should have a good future. She will do what she can to help Kenny and Angela to accept Jane. The kids have lost out but there can be gains too, provided that the adults keep hate out of the whole thing.

It comes out, as these things do, that Ken consulted Bill Nicolson about his divorce and the grounds for them. This feels to Susan like the two men against the two women. Between Bill finding out who Alberto was and agreeing to give Ken advice, she is less than impressed with his behaviour. She consciously decides to have her pound of flesh over Bill and his ditching her. She uses the TV programme for that.

She makes a point of making a very thorough exploration of the justice system and its inbuilt delays, for her ‘Live Tonight’ programme. Using a few examples of how the system could be improved, she goes on to challenge the plans of the judiciary to merge solicitors and advocates. She argues, with the assistance of expert opinion, that the existing separation of functions is necessary to maintain the independence of advocates from other than pure issues of law and legal argument. The merge could lead to disproportionate power going to a few and thereby to the potential for conflict and possible corruption. That was too great a price to pay even for a speeding up of the overall system.

She chooses the Thursday night before Bill’s wedding for this particular production. She has a leaked report that states that the government are already looking for a more significant delay in implementation - more significant than Bill understood - and that there is a swell of opinion against the proposals. This plays into her hands. She puts the right spin on to the programme for the public to conclude that vested interests are at play. Bill Nicolson’s name is mentioned, not in terms of vested interest but in terms of his leading role. The public can draw their own conclusions from that. She interviews him at length. He cannot complain that his views are not well represented. But she puts them into the context of the unpopular position. The public can deduce what they like from that. ‘Live Tonight’ takes the credit for exposing a flawed set of proposals.

Questions start to be asked in the press about self-seeking solicitors and she hears and reads that the forthcoming annual conference of the legal profession is looking for an uncontroversial presidency - Alistair Berry’s name is mentioned and a few others. Bill’s name is not. Bill is on honeymoon by this time and will hear nothing of it until his return. Susan has had more than her pound of flesh at Bill’s expense. She can put him out of her head now. Bill Nicolson is history. She has had her revenge.

The Ramseys’ final plaguing of her comes when their divorce is granted. Both parties cite her name. The divorce is uncontested and attracts little excitement except that Sarah King reminds the public, yet again, about the ‘Sex Romp’ on Mull. But that is the end of it - the story has run its course. In the ‘dog eat dog’ world of the press, Susan has come to hate this young journalist. But she turns the other way and does nothing. To attack the young journalist would be folly. Susan is still caught in the glare of publicity. There is no sense in doing something that could only sharpen the spotlight on her. She will find her opportunity in time.

Inspector Peter Philips keeps in touch with her. She realizes that he could easily be one of her conquests, but she resists, and he behaves properly. He likes her though, and personally seeks her out to keep her up to date on the enquiry. But the police are nowhere near solving the crime. They are determined to solve the case and are continuing the enquiries. They are currently analysing the TV programme that Susan was preparing on the week of the attack and they are looking at the possibility that the assault was revenge for a drugs story. Brenda Ramsey’s statement about the large car and the well-dressed man give credence to the possibility that money could be involved. The police have ruled out youth crime and stolen cars. No stolen cars at the time match the description that Brenda gave. By Christmas the trail has gone cold.

Her comfort is in Alberto. He is a wealthy and sophisticated man. The difference in their ages brings a parent child dimension that she falls into with remarkable ease - something she has not felt before. And she is sexually satisfied - there is no question about that.

He says something one night that stays with her,

“I know you, Susan.”

She realizes what he means.

He stays in her life, of course. This is a new kind of relationship, one that will play itself out in all its dimensions – the dominant woman, the submissive woman, the powerful man, parent and child, the nurturing father. Outside the bedroom and over breakfast, they are equal, able to talk and she is able to think. There is one thing in her head. She is in this relationship. It is a relationship in the fullest sense. To hell with the press, she concludes. She needed this.

He is divorced with two grown up daughters, who are barely ten years younger than she is. He does not see his ex-wife but the girls visit him regularly. He is a loving father. He has not remarried - there was plenty of other opportunity for satisfaction. His house is in the hills above Rome. He is well off. She likes everything that she hears about his circumstances.

She accepted his invitation to go to Rome for Christmas. Alberto and she were in his local church on Christmas Eve. The Roman Catholic service mesmerised even her agnostic senses. They ate at his golf club on Christmas Day. They drove to Assisi and spent a few nights in the Umbrian hill towns in the days that followed.

He said it again in Italy. He knew about her. He had made enquiries. He wanted to marry her. Would she agree to an open marriage?

What did he mean by an open marriage? He replied in a quiet and logical way. They each had careers to follow. They both had histories. They enjoyed their time together. Neither of them should ask questions about the time they spent apart. If they were faithful and could say so, fine. If they could not, that would still be fine. They liked each other and might satisfy each other - time would tell.

She accepted. They would marry in the spring, back in Italy. He introduced her to his daughters. They were happy for their Papa - they were both engaged to well off men and did not need the inheritance. And they liked Susan. Their father would not be lonely.

She was happy - stunned, but happy. It had been so quick, so clear and straightforward. The solutions to intransigent problems are always simple - she had read that somewhere. She did not know what the marriage would hold but she knew that the marriage would hold her.

She told only Linda. It was too brittle to tell anyone else. No. It was not that the marriage was brittle. It was she who was brittle. Her discovery of herself had happened. She had worked out who she was, and she could be that person in the context of this marriage. It was good and for now, private.

She sees Alberto for several weekends, back in the city in the first weeks of the year. He stays in the flat now and keeps the hotel suite for his business work. They plan a future in which he will be in Britain to develop the hotel chain and she will continue to work for the TV Company, provided they come up with a contract. She will commute to Rome as often as possible.

Back at work, the reality of the job uncertainty keeps her grounded and she works every bit as hard. In fact she works harder than usual and she is more energised. When early March comes and she still has not heard about a new contract she decides to broach the subject with Jonathon Whitney. At first he is non-committal and clearly embarrassed. She decides to push him.

“Come on, Jonathon. Let’s have it straight. I’ve worked for the Company now for the best part of five years. And I’ve done a bloody good job. They must want me to go on working for them.”

Jonathon always comes clean with his staff, to the best of his ability.

“Susan, I’m doing the best I can. But this ‘Sex Romp’ business is costing you dear. It’s not just because it happened. It’s because it was you. You were always seen to be on the high moral ground. The Chief thinks it won’t wash any more.”

Jonathon says the next words quietly.

“They will not continue your contract.”

She is blazing. She storms out of the office and slams the door. She regrets that within seconds. She would ask to see the Martin Braithwaite herself but she should calm down first. She will confront the Chief personally.

She does so a couple of days later. The Chief is charming, as always, but Susan knows a closing door when she sees one. Her talents are excellent, Martin assures her, but the Company has nothing in prospect immediately. Perhaps there will be something next year when the public have built up a demand again for her form of investigative journalism. Too much exposure could blunt the edge.

It is almost theatrical - ‘Don’t call us; we’ll call you’.

Before she flies out to Rome she puts out as many feelers as possible. If push comes to shove, there is a new woman’s magazine starting and its offices are in the city. She would be a welcome member of the editorial team, she is told. It is not a brilliant prospect but it would give her a continuing income and it would allow her planned lifestyle with Alberto to continue.

She goes round to Linda’s to talk with her about her forthcoming marriage. But the Pilar family are preoccupied with their own troubles. She does not stay long. Ken has moved out and the children are coping, but just. Despite her sadness, though, and her own trouble, Linda is glad for her visit. She says just one thing – “Be faithful to him, Susan”.

Susan nods silently, believing in this moment that she will be. After that visit Susan decides that since she is marrying abroad there is no reason why anyone else should know or find out.

She is no fairy tale bride but it is a romantic wedding, small by Italian standards, but still a smart and warm occasion. It is a civil ceremony and the wedding breakfast is in a fashionable hotel looking out on to classic wine growing country. She is happy and Alberto is clearly proud of her. She is not told where the honeymoon will be and is impressed by his choice of the leading hotel on the island of Capri. It is a week that she will not forget, of sea and spring scents and of bright colour. She comes to like him very much, and enjoys the sexual exploration of their relationship. They will be friends as well as lovers. He is strong but she feels free as well.

She contemplates the prospect that this marriage could be fully encompassing. She can see no reason at all to have any more sexual encounters. She begins to understand the notion of commitment. She says so to Alberto on their last night together on the island and she sees pleasure and hope in his eyes.

It is more than hard to go back to the city and to face the uncertain career ahead but Alberto will come over as frequently as he can and more than he needs to.

The TV programme is running to its end. Her energy for it is low, even though she knows that the quality of her work has to be kept as high as usual right to the end of the series. She cannot give the Company any excuse not to continue her contract.

Other than for her job, Susan’s life is settling and she is feeling all the joy of the promise of early summer that she has only read about before, rather than known. She decides that when the programme series finishes, she will take a break no matter what happens work wise and that she and Alberto will drive down through France and into Spain.

In mid March the Chief asks to see her.

“My dear Susan. Come in. Come in.” Martin Braithwaite’s tone could not be friendlier as she enters his office. Jonathon Whitney is already here, a smile for Susan on his face. Her hopes rise and she is not disappointed.

She is not offered the plum job she hoped for. But this is beyond her wildest hopes - would she be interested in becoming the Company’s political correspondent on international issues and with particular reference to the government’s performance on European and foreign matters? Susan would. The contract will be handsome. The work will start after the summer. It will involve a great deal of travelling. Can she cope with that? She can. She decides to tell them of her recent marriage. They like it.

Outside the meeting, Jonathon fills her in as to how all this came about. Very senior members of government were coming to dislike her influence. When the government had a few judicious words with the TV Company about removing her from the media, the media did not like that. Asked to remove her, the Chiefs decided instead to promote her, thereby making her a bigger thorn in the flesh to the government. People in government circles will think twice before they interfere with the media like this again.

And Jonathon reassures her. There would have been no such decision if there were any doubt about her ability to do the new job. She can call it a victory in every sense. She and Jonathon break with their usual self-imposed office protocol and have glasses of champagne in a local bar before Susan heads off to pack and to fly to Paris to meet Alberto. Jonathon has been a loyal boss and she will miss the bond that has built up between them when she is no longer working to him.

She is home by eight and has the evening to sort out her clothes. The doorbell rings and Peter Philips announces himself. The Ramsey business seems hardly important anymore but she is friendly to the Inspector and offers him coffee.

He apologises for calling unannounced but there has been a development whilst he was on leave and he thought she would want to know. Yes, of course she would - it was good of him to call.

“Well, Susan, we have found the culprit and the reason for the car accident. It seems as if it was in fact a simple accident - serious enough, of course. It was someone who got into a car he was not used to driving and it was an automatic. He used too much acceleration and the car shot forward. He panicked because he had had a drink and he did not report it. He says now that he had not had too much. They all say that, of course.”

She feels a wave of relief after so many months of carrying the thought at the back of her head that someone was still out there waiting to get her or Linda.

“That’s good news, Peter. But how did you find all this out now, after so long?”

“It was pure chance, really, as so often happens with these things. It was a company car, apparently, and it was in a separate incident just the other day. The incident was reported and the patrolman on duty remembered from the forensic mock-up what an indentation would look like from your accident. This time the car had been hit in the rear, so the evidence was still there. There was no forensic material to analyse after all this time, of course, but we traced the company records to see who had used the car that night and, sure enough, it had been lent out. The guy confessed right away. There will be charges but they’ll be relatively light. It should bring the matter to a close. The guy was very upset, apparently. It was not deliberate - we are quite satisfied on that count.”

They chat for a while, Susan expressing her relief that the matter is concluded. Peter Philips is about to go off duty and he is not in a hurry. He asks her, of course,

“Susan. Now that we have finished the case, I wondered whether you would like to go out for a meal or a drink. I’d, well, I’d like to get to know you better.”

She smiles, said that that would have been good but that she is just about to go off abroad. She watches his evident disappointment and offers him more coffee. But he needs to go now and says maybe they could have a meal when she gets back. In other circumstances, before Alberto, she would have said maybe.

“Anyway,” Peter said, standing up as Susan just smiles in reply, “I’m glad it’s all over. You and Linda can put it behind you. It’s been quite a time. Still, I felt sorry for the guy - he was just not used to driving an automatic and to driving in this country.”

“A foreigner?”

“Yes. He works for some hotel chain.”

She looks at him.

“A hotel chain? Peter, what’s his name?”

“I’m not sure. Wait. I have it here.” He took out his notes. “He’s Italian, I think. Yes, Paccini. Alberto Paccini.”

She does not flinch. She does not let the policeman know that she knows Alberto. She sees Peter out. She lets the buzzing of her head ease as she sits and gathers her thoughts.

She makes what sense of it she can on the flight out to Paris. She confronts Alberto straight away at the airport as he will know by now that she knows herself. He grovels.

He was trying to find her in the city on that evening last autumn and he traced her to the One-to-One. He had only a drink or two but he over-accelerated as he drew over to talk to her and Linda and to offer them a lift home. He panicked when he struck Linda and he drove off. He thought that if he said anything Susan would not see him again. He loves her. He should have confessed to her long since. Can she forgive him?

She can. She can to a point.

They have a good holiday. She returns to her new job as political correspondent. Alberto will fly over to join her within a week.

On her second night at home, she makes a decision, one that she knows she will not share with Linda. She rings Peter Philips and asks him round for a drink.

CHAPTER 33

Linda rings Jane’s doorbell. On this Friday night in late spring, it is ten o’clock and the children are away camping for the weekend with Ken. Linda has been on the phone to Susan, who has urged her to stop delaying and to go and see Jane. It is, though, still on impulse that she decides to go round on this particular evening.

Jane answers the call bell.

“Hi.”

“Jane. Hello. It’s me.”

There is a silence and then the lock clicks to release the outer door. By the time Linda emerges from the lift, Jane is at the door to meet her. But they stop, look at each other and do not touch.

“I was passing,” Linda says, limply.

“Come on in. Jacky and Nicola are here. We were just finishing supper. There’s wine on the go.”

She follows Jane into the flat, not brave enough yet to return Jane’s enquiring look with an explanation. It is good to see Nicola and Jacky, even if she is discomforted by their presence. She has not forgotten what nice women they are. Somehow, they symbolise to Linda the stability and long-term nature of women’s relationships. Their partnership says so much to her that dispels those myths of promiscuous and turbulent relationships between women that the Sarah Kings of the world delight in representing to the public. And she is also reassured to see that there is no fourth member - no Hector - present. Looking at the group, she knows what a chance she took in coming here. Hector’s presence would have been disastrous for her and maybe for Jane. She cannot imagine a championing, protective and possessive Hector welcoming a visit from her.

She warms again to Jane’s two friends. They are sophisticated, pleasant and welcoming. They greet her like a long missed friend. She realizes that they must be fully aware of the situation but they say nothing; just ask how she is. They open up the table grouping for her and she joins them as they all have some red wine and cheese. The talk is kept safe - about work mainly and about Jane’s new post. Jane is about to head off on a trip to private country houses on the north coast to look at collections of Victorian watercolours. Jane’s two women guests say nothing of the press coverage but do enquire about Linda’s well being after the car accident. Linda keeps the conversation in like vein and enquires about the jobs of Jane’s guests. Jane says little. She just allows the three to talk. She is probably waiting, Linda hopes. She is no doubt gathering her thoughts and will hopefully find some time to talk quietly with Linda.

Towards eleven o’clock, Jane’s two guests say that they really must go. It is apparently early for them to leave but they make their excuses sound genuine. They have an early start ahead of them tomorrow as they are both free of extra-curricular and medical duties and are taking the opportunity to go hill walking. Linda also knows that she and Jane are being left alone.

Jane sees them out and comes back into the room, quiet and waiting. She pours two more glasses of wine and sits down opposite Linda at the table.

Linda comes straight to the point.

“Ken and I have separated, Jane.”

Jane just looks at her. Linda sees the look of hope in her expression. She fills Jane in.

“I’m not completely free, though. The children will be with me during term times. I’m keeping the house and Tina will be with me when the children are. The children are due to go out to Spain this next weekend, in fact, for their first spell with Ken.

Jane looks at her.

“That will be hard.”

“Very.” But Linda does not dwell on it, not just now. There will be time at the weekend to grieve for the reality of the first separation. She takes the plunge.

“I am more free than I was and if you’ll have me, we could be together, in part at least.” She waits, watching Jane’s face for her reaction.

Jane just looks, then says,

“I want you.”

Linda asks the one question that has to be asked.

“What about Hector?”

Jane looks at her, says nothing except “wait here”, and disappears into her bedroom for what seems to Linda like a very long time. It is in fact only about five minutes.

When Jane comes out, she sits again opposite Linda, looks at her and says,

“I am free now. I have just rung Hector and told him.”

“So you were in a relationship?” Linda feels overwhelmed at the thought.

“Well, we were having sex. Occasionally. I would not call it a relationship – not as far as I was concerned, Linda. Hector wants more, I know, but I just wasn’t interested.”

Then, by way of explanation, she continues, not looking at Linda,

“It started one night when we had a drink. I just needed comfort, really. And I knew that you and Ken were sleeping together so it didn’t seem such a big deal. I’m sorry, Linda. I said that I’d wait and I only did to a point. Sometimes I was just so angry with you.” Tears well in Jane’s eyes as she looks up at Linda.

Linda stares at her, a mixture of pain and jealousy coursing through her. She steadies herself, knowing how Jane felt about her sleeping with Ken. She asks one more question.

“Can you still want me after I’ve been with Ken again?”

Jane answers slowly.

“Yes. I did not always think so over the months. But seeing you here, I know that I can. What about you, Linda, now that there has been Hector?”

“I came here, pretty well knowing what the situation was. So I guess I decided before getting in the car and coming round. It’s hard, Jane, and I can’t pretend otherwise. But yes, I still want to be with you.”

They spend the night together, not making love till somewhere in the small hours, each afraid to reclaim the other from recent sexual intimacy with men. But as they hold each other, lying together naked, they come back into that place that is theirs, laughing, talking and clarifying what each thought over the months of separation.

They know that it will be a future of spending holiday times together and living apart till the children are much older. They will only see each other with the children if the youngsters come to accept Jane both as a person and as Linda’s partner. There is no question of Jane sharing Linda’s house and most of their time together will be in this flat, and in Jane’s bed. That is the way that Jane, in particular, wants things to be.

And they both find that there is a new dimension to this night of lovemaking. It is one of repossession. There is an aggressive edge at some points to their touch, a sort of expiation of the pain of jealousy. They both feel it and experience it in the other. But fundamentally, there is tenderness, the tenderness that only exists between women. They know in the early light of the morning that they have made it. They have made it through the glare of publicity, the exposure and the public mockery that went with it. They have made it through separation and through their respective intimate encounters, one with a husband and the other with a male lover. They will be together from now on, connected. They know it.

They talk about the two children and whether they will come to accept Linda’s love for her partner. Angela might find it easier to make the adjustment than Kenny but Linda thinks the adjustment will come for each of them. The two women will stay in their separate jobs, of course, and use the few years ahead to advance their careers in parallel directions. They talk about much later on. They will look to moving abroad, as soon as that fits with the children’s futures.

Linda and Jane make love again, slowly, intimately, gently in the candle light of Jane’s bedroom. When it is over, Jane cries. She is crying with relief.

They sleep and wake towards nine. Jane brings coffee and they talk again. This time it is more about the circumstances that catapulted their names into the papers and the events that panned out from there. Linda is able to tell Jane that it was Brenda who sold their story to the press on the flimsiest evidence of them holding hands and touching each other on the cheek. Jane laughs, and says that on that evening in the restaurant the pair of them were so deeply in love and happy, that anyone would have seen at a glance how they felt. Linda has to acknowledge the truth in this. She says that she would like some sweet revenge for Brenda’s mischief but Jane just laughs and points out that some good came from it all, even if it was pretty horrific to live through at the time. For one thing, she was with her parents when they were over for Thanksgiving in the late Autumn and instead of taking the easy option, as she might have done in previous days, she did not introduce Hector and confirmed her feelings for Linda. They were not too wild about the fact that Linda was Jane’s boss and their first reaction was that Linda was some sort of predator. But Harry and she dissuaded their parents of that and she had the best affirmation from her parents that she could have hoped for. They would like to meet Linda as and when the time comes. Linda knows that they both have much for which to thank the now married brother Harry. He has played a big part in all this.

Linda has some other news for Jane about Brenda that she thinks really is a form of poetic justice for the woman’s mischief making. The Human Resources Section at the university told her confidentially that Brenda decided to leave the University and to take a promoted post in Administration at a college in London. She apparently talked to her friends in the workplace about starting a new life and about coming into a little money that would set her up. This, Linda reckons, was her divorce settlement. But then two things happened. She found out that she was in fact pregnant. Her lie had become the truth, although Brenda could not have known that at the time. And her father had a stroke. Dave and she would not be getting back together, even for the baby. So she asked for her job back, was given it and she has moved in with her parents to help look after her sick father and to let her mother help with the baby. She has sprung the trap of her unhappy marriage only to end up in an even bigger trap for the foreseeable future. Linda thinks that this is justice indeed for someone who planned to damage her husband’s life, Susan’s life, and, just for the money, their lives. But Jane just says,

“Poor Brenda. What a sad person she is”.

They talk about Susan and about how she helped them to stay together, supporting Linda in her decision to let the marriage end without too great a fight and encouraging Jane to hold on. Linda finds some anger in her feelings towards her friend, as she believes that without Susan’s promiscuous behaviour, the accident would never have happened, Ramsey and his wife would never have impinged on her, and they would never have been scrutinised by the newspapers. But Jane is more philosophical. It is not Susan who acted against them. Other people did. And Susan cannot help being the person she is. Can she? Linda reflects carefully before she answers.

“Probably not”, she muses. “Susan was probably life-scripted, somehow, probably in a way she does not know herself.”

“Aren’t we all?” Jane says, serious now.

“Nonsense,” Linda retorts. “You don’t think we are together because of some perverse scripting, do you?”

“Well, it’s possible, you know. There are plenty of people who would say just that.”

But Linda is not having any of that interpretation. She loves Jane. It is as simple as that. She happens to be a woman. She has loved men and women. Linda lets the subject drop and is about to start making love again when Jane asks,

“What happened to Dave?”

“Ah. That’s a story with quite an amusing twist,” Linda laughs. “Susan told me about that this morning when we were on the phone. He wrote to Susan from Heathrow airport. He decided that he was not going to complete his Divinity studies and that he was going to take his shrink’s advice and stop being one of life’s victims. He left Brenda and the baby to their fate. He waited till the sale of his flat went through and when he wrote to Susan, was just about to get on a plane to India. He wants to travel, he says, and to find God’s love in his way. Who knows, the next time we hear of him, he’ll probably be a Buddhist.”

“Good for him,” Jane murmurs, pulling Linda down on top of her.

Other Books by Avril Osborne

Available from Smashwords.com

Casa Di Corsa

Stalker

No Tide Waits

An Authentic Life