The Keeper of Lost Things(31)

As the last note smoldered into the chilly air, Laura looked across at Freddy. He was looking straight at her, and when her eyes met his, he smiled. Laura went to gather the tea lights. But Sunshine wasn’t quite finished. She rattled her piece of paper and cleared her throat.

“I am the resurrection and the light, saith the Lord: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And it’s good night from me and it’s good night from him.”

When Laura went up to bed that night, the room felt different somehow. Perhaps it was warmer. Or maybe that was just the wine she had shared with Freddy and Sunshine to celebrate Therese and Anthony’s reunion. The things on the dressing table were all in order and the little blue clock had stopped at 11:55 as usual. She wound it up so that it could stop at the same time again tomorrow, drew the curtains, and turned to get in bed.

There were petals of rose confetti on the bedcovers.





CHAPTER 22


Eunice


1987

Bette trotted along just ahead of them surveying the park for undesirables. Every now and then she would turn to check that they were following her obediently; her velveteen face crumpled into a comical frown. She was named after the film star to whom she bore an unnerving resemblance, but they had taken to calling her Baby Jane after one of her namesake’s most memorable characters.

Bomber had been freeze-framed by Douglas’s death. He had held the little dog in his arms until long after his final breath had sighed “the end,” and his soft fur had grown cold and strange. Eunice had howled an eruption of pain, but Bomber sat rigid and dry-eyed as an ash cloud of grief settled over him and choked his tears. The Douglas-shaped space in the office hurt every day. They were a man down and a donut too many, but Eunice kept going; automatic pilot at first, but onward nevertheless. Bomber crashed and burned. He drank away his pain and then he slept away the drink.

In the end only one man could reach him. It was difficult to say who had fallen for Tom Cruise the hardest, Bomber or Eunice, as he swaggered from bike to bar to plane in his Ray-Bans. They had seen Top Gun three nights in a row when it opened at the Odeon last year. Three weeks after Douglas died, Eunice stormed Bomber’s flat with her spare key and kicked his grieving arse out of bed. As he sat at the kitchen table, tears finally released and dripping down his face and into the mug of black coffee Eunice had made, she took his hand.

“God, he loved flying with you, Bomber. But he’d have flown anyway . . . without you. He’d have hated it, but he would’ve done it.”

The following day, Bomber came into the office sober, and the following week Baby Jane arrived from Battersea Dogs’ Home; a bossy bundle of black and blond velvet. Baby Jane didn’t like donuts. The first time she was offered one, she sniffed at it disdainfully and turned away. It might as well have been a turd tartlet. Baby Jane liked Viennese whirls. For a stray, she had expensive tastes.

As the diminutive pug nosed an empty crisp packet on the grass, Eunice looked up at Bomber and almost recognized him again. His grief was still smudged under his eyes and pinched into his cheeks, but his smile was limbering up and his shoulders unfurling from their disconsolate stoop. She was never going to be a replacement, but she was already a distraction, and if Baby Jane had her way, which she usually did, Eunice had no doubt whatsoever that she would eventually prove to be a superstar in her own right.

Back in the office, Eunice put the kettle on while Bomber went through the post. Baby Jane settled herself onto her cushion and rested her head on her front paws, gathering herself for the arduous task of eating her cake. When Eunice came through with the tea, Bomber was waving a slim volume of short stories in the air that had just arrived from a rival publisher.

“Lost and Found by Anthony Peardew. Hmm, I’ve heard of this. It’s doing rather well. I wonder why old Bruce has sent it to me.”

Eunice picked up the accompanying compliments slip and read it.

“To gloat,” she answered.

“‘Bomber,” she read, “please accept a copy of this hugely successful collection with my compliments. You had your chance, old chap, and you blew it!’”

Bomber shook his head.

“No idea what he’s talking about. If this Peardew fellow had sent it to us first, we’d have snapped it up. It’s an excess of hair spray. It’s addled his brains.”

Eunice picked up the book and flicked through the pages. The author’s name and title together, like two flints, sparked a vague memory; a manuscript? Eunice racked her brain for the answer but it was like bobbing for apples; just when she thought she’d got it by the skin of her teeth, it slipped away. Baby Jane sighed theatrically. Her cake was “en retard” and she was weak with hunger. Eunice laughed and ruffled the soft rolls of velvet on her head.

“You’re such a diva, young lady! You’ll get fat and then no more cakes for you. Just jogging round the park and the occasional stick of celery. If you’re lucky.”

Baby Jane stared up at Eunice dolefully, her black button eyes framed by long dark lashes. It worked every time. She got her cake. At last.

Just as she was licking her lips in an optimistic search for remaining flecks of cream, the phone rang. Each pair of rings was followed by an imperious bark. Since her arrival, Baby Jane had quickly assumed a managerial position and she ran a very tight kennel. Bomber answered.