The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper(50)

Lucy dug in the trowel, scooped and then flung weeds, not watching where they landed. “Well, yes, you do. You took off to Graystock Manor, then left me a garbled message to say you’d been attacked by a tiger.”

“I went to London, too.” He had decided that he needed to tell her the truth. He wanted her to know about the bracelet and the stories it held.

Lucy clenched her teeth, which made dimples appear in her cheeks. She focused intently on each weed, staring, then jabbing. “I’m really worried about you.”

“There’s no need.”

“Of course there’s need. You’re acting very oddly. What on earth are you doing traveling around the country?”

Arthur looked at his shoes. The toes were flecked with soil from Lucy’s digging. “I need to tell you something. It will explain what I’ve been up to. It’s about your mother...”

Lucy didn’t look up. “Go on, then.”

Arthur wished that she would meet his eyes, but she was intent on attacking the lawn. It looked as if moles had been on a rampage. He spoke, anyway. “I was clearing out your mother’s wardrobe, you see, one year after she...you know. I was most surprised to find a gold charm bracelet stuffed inside her boot. I’d never seen it before. It had all sorts of charms on it—an elephant, a heart, a flower. Do you know anything about it?”

Lucy shook her head. “No. Mum didn’t wear stuff like that. A charm bracelet? Are you sure it was hers?”

“Well, it was in her boot. And Mr. Mehra in India said that he gave her the elephant.”

“An elephant?”

“Well, a charm one. Apparently your mother was Mr. Mehra’s child-minder in Goa, when he was a boy.”

“Dad.” Lucy sat back on her heels. Her cheeks reddened. “You’re not making sense. Mum never went to India.”

“That’s what I thought, too. But she did, Lucy. She lived there. Mr. Mehra told me and I believe him. I know it sounds awfully strange. I’m trying to find out where else she lived, what she did before we married. That’s why I went to Graystock, why I went to London.”

“I don’t understand what’s going on here. What are you talking about?”

Arthur slowed down his words. “I found a number engraved on one of the charms on the bracelet. It was a phone number. I spoke to a wonderful man in India who said that Miriam used to look after him. I’m finding out things about your mother that I never knew.”

“Mum never went to India,” Lucy insisted.

“I know. It’s difficult to believe.”

“There must be some kind of mix-up.”

“Mr. Mehra is a doctor. He described your mother’s laugh perfectly, and her bag of marbles. I believe he’s telling the truth.”

Lucy started to stab the soil again. She stopped briefly to scoop up a worm with the tip of her trowel and deposit it in a plant pot, then used her trowel like a dagger again. All the while she muttered under her breath.

Arthur didn’t know how to handle other people’s emotions. When Lucy’s teenage hormones reared their ugly head when she turned thirteen, he found the best way to deal with it was to study the newspaper and to leave it all to Miriam. It was she who dealt with tears over boys, a brief dabble with blue-streaked hair, the slamming of doors and the occasional thrown coffee cup. She told Dan to quieten down when he was high-spirited and regularly said to him, “Don’t speak to your father like that.”

Arthur felt if he ignored moods, maybe they would go away. But now he could see that his daughter was consumed by something. It was as if she had swallowed a swarm of bees that were bursting to get out. He couldn’t stand it any longer. “Lucy. Are you okay?” He placed his hand on her arm. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you this before.”

She squinted against the sun, her forehead rippling. “Yes, I’m fine.”

He paused for a moment, wondering whether to leave things alone, like he had done so many times over the years. But he kept his hand in place. “No, you’re not. I can tell.”

Lucy stood up straight. She dropped the trowel to the ground. “I don’t think I can handle all this.”

“All what?”

“You, on your mad travels and telling me strange stories about Mum. Trying to cope without Anthony. Having lost the...” She ran her hand through her hair, then shook her head. “Oh, look, it doesn’t matter.”

“Yes, it does. Of course it does. I didn’t mean to worry you. Sit down with me and talk. I promise to try to listen. Tell me what’s wrong.”

For a few seconds she gazed off into the distance. Her lip curled up to the left as she seemed to consider his offer. “Okay,” she said finally.

She wrestled two deck chairs out of the shed and set them on the grass next to each other, batting off the dust and soil with a gardening glove. She and her father sat down, their faces tilted toward the sun, squinting so that whatever they said to each other was done without looking into each other’s eyes. It brought a kind of anonymity to what they had to say.

“What is it?” he said.

Lucy took a deep breath. “I want to tell you why I didn’t go to Mum’s funeral. You need to know.”

“It’s in the past. You were poorly. You said goodbye in your own way.” He spoke the words, forgiving her already even though it agonized him that she hadn’t been there. He longed with every bone in his body to know how his daughter had done such a thing.