The Love of My Life(78)

‘Really?’

‘Really.’

Charlie studies my face, then slumps back into his armchair. ‘Oh,’ he says. ‘Fair enough. Well – I had to ask.’

He thinks for a while.

‘I really wouldn’t expect to hear from her,’ I add. ‘If that helps. The letter was surprising enough.’

I stop there, because I have no idea what Charlie knows about the relationship between me and Janice.

‘I just had a suspicion Mum tried to reach you recently,’ he says. ‘Aside from the letter, I mean.’

I watch him, wary of saying the wrong thing. ‘Why? You know we haven’t been in touch for many years, don’t you . . . ?’

There’s a tiny shift. Charlie gets his phone out of his pocket (silicone cover, tatty at the edges) and checks it. The screen is blank. ‘I do. But there must be a reason why she chose now, of all times, to write to you about crabs. It feels significant. I just wondered if she’d tried to reach you some other way. In case we’d refused to give you the letter.’

He’s lying. There’s something else.

‘I can share the letter with you, if you want, Charlie, but I imagine you’ve already read it?’

‘Yeah, I have.’ He looks at the door, and I realise this is about to end. This miracle is nearly over, and there’s nothing I can do about it.

‘So you’ve really heard nothing? Nothing at all?’

‘Nothing at all.’

‘OK,’ he says. ‘I suppose I should go. I’ve got a summer job, up in Queens Park. Easy to get there from here. But I’ll be late if I don’t leave soon.’

My heart begins to ache, and I smile, kindly and sensibly, so he knows I’m the sort of a person he could easily see again if he wanted to, not some maniac who tried to take him from a park when he was a toddler and will cry every time she sees him as an adult.

‘Of course,’ I say. ‘I really am sorry not to be able to help.’

Next to me, on another console table, Jill has one of those leather boxes that hold a stack of notelets and a pen. I scribble down my number and then, as an afterthought, my address. ‘You’re welcome to get in touch if you need to ask anything else,’ I say. ‘Or if you just need to . . . talk.’

Charlie takes the note and stands up. ‘Oh, I know where you live,’ he says. He breaks off.

I stop. ‘It was you. In the baseball cap.’

He winces. ‘You saw me?’

I close my eyes. Thank God. Thank God. ‘I did see you. And not just outside my house. I think I saw you outside both my workplaces. Plymouth and London. Was that you, too?’

He looks like he might pass out with embarrassment. ‘Christ, I’m so sorry,’ he says. Even his ears have coloured. ‘I feel awful. I didn’t mean to . . .’

He picks at a splodge of something – ketchup, I think – on his jeans. ‘I only found out your name a few weeks ago. I wanted to . . . I really am so sorry. I just wanted to check you out, I guess. Try and get a measure of you, your life . . . I’m really sorry. I thought I’d been quite sly.’

I tell him not to worry. Him trying to take a quiet look at his mother is no worse than me trying to take a quiet look at my son, all those years ago.

He apologises again, but then looks at the door, and I know this really is it.

‘I hope your mum comes back soon,’ I say, desperately. I can’t stand calling her his ‘mum’. I want to be Mum. ‘I’m sure she will. And in the meantime, please don’t hesitate to call, or just turn up unannounced, I really don’t mind. Anything I can do to help.’

He smiles briefly. ‘Thanks. At least we know she’s alive. But it’s worrying. Anyway, look, thanks for your time. It’s been nice to meet you.’

And then he’s off, walking out of the room, and I want to throw my arms round him, tackle him, lock the door. But I just walk calmly behind him, smiling as he turns. The energy saving lights click on as he steps out into the corridor. ‘Take care,’ he says, and then he’s gone.

Jill makes coffee and puts some brandy in mine, even though I tell her I don’t want any. But I’m grateful for it, by the time it’s in my hands. I am still, on her sofa, but inside me everything is tumbling. Did I get it right? Did he like me? Would he want to meet again?

No matter how desperate I’ve been to see him over the years, I’ve always agreed with Jeremy: the approach must come from Charlie, not me. But as the years have passed, I’ve slowly given up on that happening.

The incident on Alnmouth beach four years ago really was an accident. I always avoided going up there in the school holidays because I knew the Rothschilds would be there. But in term time, when I wanted to go up to Alnmouth, I’d turn on Radio 4 between 6 a.m. and 9 a.m. If Jeremy was on air, he had to be in London, and I was safe to go. If he wasn’t on air, I stayed away.

But, of course, that was the one time I’d forgotten. I had a cancer diagnosis on my mind, a dismissal from the BBC, a pregnancy – I simply didn’t remember to check; I just wanted to get up there, to the comfort of those vast beaches and racing clouds, the hope of a Hemigrapsus takanoi encounter.

I didn’t see Janice and him until I was nearly upon them, and all hell broke loose. I will never forget her voice calling me every name under the sun.