The Keeper of Lost Things(61)

Eunice plonked a cup of tea down in front of him, deliberately sploshing some of the dishwater-colored liquid from the cup into the saucer.

“So you don’t think that any of your readers might like to be challenged at all? Flex their intellectual muscles, so to speak? Form their own opinions or extrapolate their own conclusions for once?”

Bruce lifted the cup to his lips, and then seeing its contents close to, changed his mind and set it down again with an irritated clatter.

“My dear, the readers like what we tell them they will like. It’s as simple as that.”

“Then why can’t you tell them to like Anthony Peardew’s new stories?”

Bomber kept the “touché” under his breath. Just.

“Anthony Peardew. Wasn’t he the chap whose collection of stories did rather well for you?”

Bruce raised his eyebrows so high in exasperation that they disappeared into his cobweb coiffure.

“For God’s sake, Bomber! Do try and keep up. That’s what I’ve been saying. The first lot did really well; happy stories, happy endings, happy bank balances all round. But not anymore. He’s gone from The Sound of Music to The Midwich Cuckoos. But I’ve drawn the line. I’ve told him. It’s either ‘Doh, a deer’ or out on your ear!”

Bruce had once worked from offices in the same building as Bomber, and still visited for a free cup of tea and a gossip if he was passing. However, failure to enlist Bomber in his condemnation of the villainous Anthony Peardew and scant sympathy from Eunice meant that, on this occasion, Bruce’s visit was a short one.

“I wish we’d managed to sign poor Anthony before Bruce did.” Bomber sighed. “I liked his first collection, but his new stories sound intriguing. I wonder if I should try a spot of poaching . . .”

Eunice took a small parcel from the drawer in her desk and handed it to Bomber. It was wrapped in thick, charcoal-gray paper and tied with a bright pink ribbon.

“I know it’s not your birthday until next week”—Bomber’s face lit up like a small boy’s; he loved surprises—“but I thought that after a visit from Bruce the Bogeyman, you could do with cheering up.”

It was a copy of The Birdcage. They had been to see it on Bomber’s birthday the previous year, and he had laughed so hard that he had almost choked on his popcorn.

“I wish Ma could have seen it,” he had said. “It’s a damn sight more cheerful than Philadelphia.” Grace had been dead for eighteen months now. She had survived Godfrey by just over a year, and then died suddenly but peacefully in her sleep at Folly End. She had been buried next to Godfrey in the grounds of the church where they had been members of the congregation and stalwarts of the flower-arranging team, and Summer Fête and Harvest Supper Committees, for almost half a century. As Bomber and Eunice had stood side by side in the sun-and-shade-dappled churchyard on the day of Grace’s funeral, their thoughts had turned to their own leaving ceremonies.

“I’m for burning not burial,” declared Bomber. “Less room for error,” he added.

“And then I want you to mix my ashes with Douglas’s and Baby Jane’s, providing, of course, that I outlive her, and scatter us somewhere fabulous.”

Eunice watched as the funeral party wandered slowly back to their cars.

“What makes you so sure that you’ll die before me?”

Bomber took her arm as they too began to make their way out of the churchyard.

“Because you’re a good few years younger than me, and you’ve led a purer life.”

Eunice snorted her contention, but Bomber continued.

“And because you’re my faithful assistant and you must do as I command.”

Eunice laughed.

“‘Somewhere fabulous’” isn’t a very specific command.”

“When I think of somewhere specific, I’ll let you know.”

Just before they reached the lych-gate, Bomber had stopped and squeezed her arm.

“And one more thing.”

He had held her in his gaze with eyes that shone with unspilled tears.

“Promise me that if I ever end up like Pa, mad as a box of frogs and stuck away in a home, you’ll find a way to . . . you know what. Get. Me. Out.”

Eunice had forced a smile, though at that moment someone walked across her grave.

“Cross my heart and hope to die.”

Bomber showed his present to Baby Jane, but once she had ascertained that it was inedible and didn’t squeak or bounce, she lost what little interest she had mustered.

“So, what do you want to do for your birthday?” Eunice asked, twirling the pink ribbon around her fingers.

“Well,” said Bomber, “how about combining my birthday with our usual annual outing?”

Eunice grinned. “Brighton it is!”





CHAPTER 39


“It’s not the ring.”

Laura kicked one of Carrot’s many tennis balls across the lawn in frustration. Freddy stopped digging and leaned on his spade, ready to commiserate as required. Laura had come out into the garden, where Freddy was digging compost into the rose garden, with little purpose other than to vent her frustration. Freddy grinned at her.

“Never mind. We’ll sort it out eventually.”