A Lesser Evil - Lesley Pearse [162]
‘I’ve got a lot more to reproach myself with than that,’ Clara said sadly. ‘I should have been kinder when she lost the baby. I didn’t meant to be nasty, but we had that long train journey, and she wasn’t the least pleased to see me. I wish I could learn to curb my sharp tongue.’
‘Fifi forgot about all that once you came to visit her. And whatever you’d said or done, it couldn’t have prevented this,’ he said to soothe her. ‘If anyone’s to blame it’s me. I should have been more understanding after she found Angela, but I got irritated when she seemed so obsessed by it. All I could think about was working more so I could get enough money together so we could move away. If I’d just been there listening, maybe she wouldn’t have resorted to snooping.’
‘I doubt it, Dan,’ Clara said. ‘She always was a law unto herself. I never found a way to curb that curiosity of hers. I can remember dozens of times when she was still a child when I had to go searching for her. She’d slip out the gate when I wasn’t looking and go exploring. Sometimes I’d find her in someone’s garden, and she’d have gone right into their house if the door had been left open. She just didn’t seem to have any normal sense of caution.’
Harry interrupted them by coming back and slumping down into his chair. ‘No news,’ he said sadly. ‘Patty said that lots of the people she’d contacted to see if Fifi had been in touch with them had rung back to ask if there’s any news. She said everyone was being very kind.’
Clara told Harry what she and Dan had been talking about.
‘I want you both to stop blaming yourselves,’ Harry said when she’d finished. He looked sternly at both his wife and Dan. ‘We all know Fifi likes drama, and when there isn’t one, she creates one. It’s no good you thinking you shouldn’t have taken her to London, Dan, you had to go, that was where the work was and a wife’s place is at her husband’s side. I’m just sorry that we didn’t welcome you into our family. We were foolish and short-sighted. In the last two days we’ve seen for ourselves why Fifi loves you.’
Such a frank admission, and the affectionate and paternal way it was made, was too much for Dan after such a harrowing day and Clara’s apology too, and all at once he was crying. He tried to stop himself but he couldn’t, and he covered his face with his hands, appalled that he was showing himself up in public.
Clara got up and enveloped him in her arms. ‘You poor boy,’ she whispered as she rocked him against her chest. ‘Stay here in the hotel with us tonight, we’ll look after you.’
Her words were a comfort, for Dan couldn’t remember anyone ever offering to look after him, not even when he was a child.
In that moment he saw the truth about Clara. She had a hard shell, that much was certain, she liked her own way, and she was stubborn. But the hard shell was there to protect the softness inside her, and she was just like any other good mother, prepared to fight to keep her children from anything that she perceived as harm. And that had once included him.
‘Thank you, I appreciate it,’ he whispered, pulling himself together. ‘I’ll be fine, just a temporary blip. But I’ll go on home now. I feel closer to Fifi with all her things around me.’
They came out to the hotel foyer with him, and Clara hugged him and kissed his cheek. ‘Try and get a good night’s sleep,’ she said tenderly. ‘You never know, the police might have some good news by the morning.’
Harry embraced Dan too. ‘We’ll come over in the morning and go down to the police station together,’ he said.
‘Would you like me to go down to your work with you later on? You really must talk to your boss; you don’t want to lose your job on top of everything else.’
Dan nodded. He hadn’t contacted his firm since Thursday, and he knew he must, even though his job seemed unimportant right now. ‘That would be good,’ he said, and tried to