The Family Upstairs(74)

She punches him in the chest with two furled fists.

‘You left her!’ she cries. ‘You left her! You left the baby behind!’

He grabs hold of her hands and he says, ‘No! You left! It was you! I was the one who stayed. The only one who stayed! I mean, you ask where I’ve been. Where on earth have you been?’

‘I’ve been …’ she begins, and then she lets her fists unfurl and her arms drop. ‘I’ve been in hell.’

They fall silent for a moment. Then Lucy steps back and calls Marco to her. ‘Marco,’ she says. ‘This is Henry. He’s your uncle. Henry, this is my son. Marco. And this is Stella, my daughter.’

Marco looks from his mother to Henry and back again. ‘I don’t understand. What does this have to do with the baby?’

‘Henry was—’ she begins. She sighs and starts again. ‘There was a baby. She lived here with us all when we were children. We had to leave her here because … well, because we had to. And Henry is here, like me, to see the baby, now that she’s grown up.’

Henry clears his throat and says, ‘Um.’

Lucy turns to look at him.

‘I’ve met her already,’ he says. ‘I’ve met Serenity. She was here. At the house.’

Lucy gasps softly. ‘Oh my God. Is she OK?’

‘She is,’ he replies. ‘Hale and hearty, pretty as a picture.’

‘But where is she?’ she asks. ‘Where is she now?’

‘Well, she is currently with our old friend Clemency.’

Lucy inhales sharply. ‘Clemency! Oh my God. Where is she? Where does she live?’

‘She lives, I believe, in Cornwall. Here, look.’ Henry switches on his phone and shows her a little flashing dot on a map. ‘There’s Serenity,’ he says, pointing at the dot. ‘Number twelve, Maisie Way, Penreath, Cornwall. I popped a little tracking device on her phone. Just so we wouldn’t lose her again.’

‘But how do you know that’s where Clemency is?’

‘Aha,’ he says, closing down the app displaying Serenity’s location and opening up another app.

He presses an arrow on an audio bar. And suddenly there are voices. Two women, talking, quietly.

‘Is that her talking?’ asks Lucy. ‘Is that Serenity?’

He listens. ‘Yes, I believe it is,’ he says, turning up the volume.

Another voice breaks in.

‘And that,’ he says, ‘is Clemency. Listen.’





58


Clemency has asked Miller to leave them alone. She wants to tell Libby the story in private. So Miller takes the dog for a walk and Clemency tucks her long legs under her on the sofa and slowly begins.

‘The plan was that we would rescue the baby. Henry would drug the grown-ups with this sleeping draught he’d made and we would steal the shoes that were in the boxes in David and Birdie’s room, steal some normal clothes, take the money and the baby and then we’d take the key from my dad’s pouch and run into the street and stop a policeman or a trustworthy-looking grown-up and we’d tell them there were people in the house who’d kept us prisoners for years. Then somehow we’d all find our way down here to my mum. We hadn’t quite worked out how we’d contact her. A phone box, reverse the charges, a wing and a prayer.’ Clemency smiles wryly. ‘As you can see, we hadn’t really thought it through very well. We just wanted to be gone.

‘And then one day my dad announced he was going to throw a party for Birdie’s thirtieth birthday. Henry called us into his room. He was kind of our unofficial leader by this point, I suppose. And he said we were going to do it then. During Birdie’s birthday party. He said he’d offer to cook all the food. He asked me to make a little pocket for him to tuck into his leggings so that he could put his bottles of sleeping draught in there. And then we’d all need to act as if we were really very enthusiastic about Birdie’s birthday party. Lucy and I even learned a special piece on the fiddle for her.’

‘And Phin?’ asks Libby. ‘Where was Phin involved in all of this?’

Clemency sighs. ‘Phin kept himself to himself generally. And Henry didn’t want him involved. Those two …’ She sighed. ‘It was kind of toxic between them. Henry loved Phin. But Phin hated Henry. Plus of course, Phin was ill.’

‘What was wrong with him?’

‘We never really found out. I wondered if maybe he’d had cancer or something. It’s why Mum and I always thought he might have, you know, passed away.

‘Anyway,’ she continues. ‘The day of the party we were tense. All three of us. But we kept up the pretence of excitement about the stupid bloody party. And in some ways of course we were excited about the party. It was our freedom party. At the other end of the party lay a normal life. Or at least a different life.

‘And we played our fiddle piece for Birdie, distracting the grown-ups while Henry cooked the food and it was so bizarre, the contrast between my father and Birdie and everyone else. We all looked so sickly, you know. But Birdie and my dad, they were both glowing with vitality and satisfaction. My dad sat with his arm slung around her shoulder, this look of absolute and utter dominion on his face.’ Clemency kneads at the cushion on her lap. Her gaze is hard and tight. ‘It was like,’ she continues, ‘like he’d “allowed” his woman a party, out of the bountiful depths of his heart, as if he was thinking: Look at the happiness I have created. Look how I can do whatever I want and yet people still love me.’