Relative Sins

The vicar gave his final blessing and gradually the mourners began to drift away. Some of them—the Reverend Mr Bowden amongst them—approached Sara, and, clasping her hand, offered their sincere condolences. Others, she knew, she would see back at the house—not least the staff at Perry Edmunds, who had loved Harry as their own.

She wondered if any of them found it as difficult to equate the humorous man she had known and loved with the gloomy service in the churchyard. It was hard to imagine leaving Harry here, and she had to remind herself that it was only his body, not his spirit, in the grave. In spirit Harry would always inhabit the warmer places of the world—the villa they had lived in in Kuwait, perhaps, or the sprawling bungalow in Rio.

‘Sara.’

She stiffened.

She’d been expecting to hear that voice ever since she and Ben had arrived in England. She’d actually been half-afraid that he might come to meet her at the airport. After all, she’d reasoned, he was bound to have flown home for his brother’s funeral. Harry had been the only sibling he had.

But only Harry’s father had been waiting in the arrivals hall. And when they’d arrived at the house only Elizabeth Reed had been there. She hadn’t learned until the following morning that Alex was on a filming assignment in Kashmir, and that so far they had not been able to reach him.

‘I’m sorry.’ Alex spoke again, but whether he was apologising for being late or offering his condolences for Harry’s death she couldn’t be sure. She didn’t particularly care, she thought rather bitterly. It would have been so much easier for her if he’d stayed away.

‘I know you must be thinking the worst, but I did get here as fast as I could. Unfortunately I didn’t get into London until after midnight, and I couldn’t get a connecting flight until this morning.’

His explanation was legitimate enough, and Sara had no doubt that he had come as quickly as he’d been able. Bearing in mind his busy schedule, she amended uncharitably. Alex always had lived life to the full.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ she replied now, her expression revealing nothing of the turmoil she felt inside. He’d be gone again in a couple of days, she reassured herself tensely. Until then, surely she could be polite.

‘We’ll talk at the house,’ Alex added, and she was forced to meet his piercing eyes. ‘Just remember—I’m here if you need me. It’s what Harry would have wanted, I know.’

Do you? she thought.

For a moment Sara felt a wave of almost crippling fury sweep over her, and her anger demanded some kind of outlet for its force. But Harry’s parents had joined them, Elizabeth taking Ben’s hand and leading him away, turning them into a family unit which she had no right to break—well, not at this moment anyway, Sara thought grimly. Later they would see. She didn’t need anyone’s help, particularly not Alex Reed’s.

To her relief he seemed to sense that this was not the time to put pressure on her, and although she resented it he accompanied his mother to the car. Watching him talking to Ben in that charming way he had, introducing himself to her son and making him smile, irritated her beyond belief. He had no right to do that, she thought indignantly. Harry’s son meant nothing to him.

‘Come along.’

Harry’s father touched her arm, and she turned to look at Robert Reed with some remorse. This wasn’t easy for any of them, and she had to keep her head until it was over.

‘Don’t think too badly of him,’ murmured her fatherin-law as they walked to where the limousines were waiting, and Sara had no difficulty in interpreting whom he meant. ‘If Newcastle hadn’t been fogbound, he’d have landed here before nine o’clock. As it was, the flight was diverted to Tees-side and he had to hire a car from there.’

‘Well, it is a raw day,’ Sara offered, realising that she couldn’t expect his father to understand how she felt about her brother-in-law. And fortunately Robert didn’t notice anything amiss.

‘I imagine it’s quite a change from the kind of climate you’re used to,’ he commented. And then, as if regretting his implication, he went on, ‘You must think of Perry Edmunds as your home now.’

‘Thank you.’

Sara managed the words of gratitude, but she knew that she couldn’t stay here. Apart from anything else she had to get a job. She had no intention of living on the Reeds’ charity, and she doubted if Harry’s pension would support her. She had been working in London when she’d met Harry, and that was where she expected to make her home.

All the same, as she climbed into the back of the limousine beside Elizabeth and her son she couldn’t help thinking how swiftly things could change. Two weeks ago the most important decision she’d had to make was which wine to serve at dinner. Now her husband was dead, her son was without a father, and the pleasant life they’d had in Rio was just a bitter-sweet memory.

‘Are you all right?’

Her mother-in-law was eyeing her intently now, and Sara wondered what Elizabeth thought she’d seen in her face—regret, perhaps, grief, sorrow certainly, but was she looking for remorse, for a self-reproach that Sara couldn’t feel?

She knew that her mother-in-law blamed her for Harry’s taking his family to Brazil in the first place. Working for the Foreign Office, he could no doubt have requested a posting in London after Kuwait, but the thought of coming back to England after two years spent in the heat of a tropical climate had not appealed to Harry, and it had been his decision to take his family to Rio and prolong their tenure overseas.

‘Besides,’ he’d argued when Sara had felt obliged to make a token plea on behalf of the Reeds, ‘Ben will have to go to school soon, and then we’ll probably settle in England for a while. Let’s enjoy our freedom while we have it. We’ll have years and years of boredom when we get back.’

Sara’s lips trembled, and she determinedly caught the lower one between her teeth and bit it. She didn’t want anyone’s sympathy. She’d handle this in her own way—well, she and Ben together, she thought tenderly. What would she do without her son?

Which prompted the realisation that sooner or later she was going to have to sit down with Ben and explain the situation to him. It was all very well consoling herself with the thought that none of this would really touch him. The fact remained that he had to be made to understand their new circumstances. They weren’t going to have a lot of money, and Ben was going to find living in the small house or apartment that she would be able to afford for them vastly different from the luxurious bungalow that had been his home these last two years.

The sedate journey from St Matthew’s, which lay on the outskirts of the village of Edmundsfield, to Perry Edmunds, the Reeds’ house, only took a few minutes. Without the top-hatted figure of the chief mourner, striding along at the head of the procession of cars, the drivers quickened their pace. Probably as eager as she was, Sara thought ruefully, to leave the churchyard behind.

Was there ever such a contrast as between the heat and colour of South America and Northumberland in the depths of winter? Even the trees were stark and skeletal, the grass a dirty green beneath their feet.

Alex and his father were occupying the seats immediately behind the driver, and despite her best efforts Sara couldn’t help but be aware that Alex was a bare two or three feet in front of her. She’d hoped that she’d never have to see him again, that he’d find the prospect of visiting his brother and his wife boring—and so far he had. And since Harry’s death, she had to admit, she’d wished it had been him…

Ben stared out of the window for most of the journey, and Sara diverted herself by wondering what her son was thinking. Certainly their present surroundings were entirely unfamiliar to a little boy who was used to the overcrowded cities and forever stretching beaches of the southern hemisphere. Yet he hadn’t complained, except for that moment by the graveside when he’d said he was cold. He’d been almost preternaturally obedient, and she could only assume that the gravity of the situation had got to him in some way at least.

She sighed. When they’d boarded the plane to London a few days ago—the plane which had, incidentally, brought his father’s lifeless body home for burial—he had seemed to regard the whole trip as a kind of adventure. He’d been excited about coming to England—a place he didn’t even know. He had been born in the army hospital in Kuwait, Sara remembered tightly. Had Harry sensed how desperate she’d been to get away…?

Now, however, they were back with a vengeance, with no obvious alternative in sight. She really would have to try and explain their situation to Ben. However difficult it might prove, she owed him that at least.

‘You’re very quiet,’ remarked Elizabeth beside her, and Sara realised that Harry’s mother was still waiting for her to say how she was.

‘I’m tired,’ she said, with an involuntary gesture of apology. ‘I haven’t slept very well since we got back.’

‘At least you’re alive,’ remarked Elizabeth in an undertone. ‘How lucky you weren’t with Harry when he was killed.’ The underlying message was clear, and Sara guessed that now that her husband had been buried his mother wouldn’t hesitate to show her claws.

‘Liz!’

Evidently Robert Reed had heard his wife’s comment too, and to Sara’s relief the older woman said no more. But Sara had no doubt that the subject had only been abandoned for the time being. Harry’s mother would probably return to it when they were alone.

The car glided between the gates of Perry Edmunds, and Ben turned round to kneel on the seat. ‘The other cars are following us!’ he exclaimed. ‘Are we going to have a party?’ He drew back to look at his mother. ‘Will Daddy be there?’

‘Your father’s dead, Ben!’ exclaimed his grandmother tautly. She looked at Sara. ‘I thought you’d told him. Where does he think we’ve been?’

‘I don’t imagine he associated this morning’s events with anything, Mother,’ declared Alex impatiently, glancing over his shoulder. ‘I don’t know why Sara thought he ought to attend. He’s far too young.’

If Sara had hoped that Mrs Reed might explain that Ben’s attendance had been her idea, she was disappointed. The cars had negotiated the curving drive and were stopping in the courtyard before the house, and Harry’s mother thrust open her door and climbed out. Ben followed her before Sara could prevent him, and she was forced to watch her mother-in-law grasp his hand and lead him indoors.

‘She’s upset.’

Alex’s unwelcome solicitude was almost more than she could take. ‘Aren’t we all?’ she said, hoping Harry’s father would forgive her, and, ignoring any assistance, she stepped out of the car.

Mrs Fraser, the Reeds’ housekeeper, had evidently beaten them back from the church, and was standing at the door of the house now, awaiting the return of the family. She was a middle-aged Scottish woman, dour of appearance but gentle of manner, who had worked for Elizabeth Reed for the past twenty-five years.

Sensitive to the day’s events, she offered Sara a compassionate smile. ‘The little one’s away for some lemonade,’ she declared, referring to Ben’s disappearance. ‘I’ll see that he takes no harm. He can eat his lunch with Alison and myself.’

‘Thank you, Mrs Fraser.’ Sara was grateful, as much to know that her son was not being manipulated by his grandmother as for the housekeeper’s obvious kindness. ‘I expect you’ll find he’s hungry. His appetite hasn’t suffered, thank goodness.’

‘Not like his mother’s,’ observed Mrs Fraser, with rather more outspokenness than was usual. Her lips curved down at her presumption but she didn’t withdraw her statement. It made Sara feel that at least someone at Perry Edmunds cared about her welfare as well.

Once inside the house Sara wished that she could have a few minutes to herself, but the cars that had followed them back from the cemetery were disgorging their passengers, and everyone expected Harry’s widow to be there to accept their condolences.