Believing the Lie - Elizabeth George [121]
She shook her head. “Is it important? Dad has gobs of money.”
“True enough. But I can’t imagine Ian didn’t try to talk him out of tossing so much Nick’s way without some sort of scheme for repayment, even if the repayment was to take a century and be made without interest. And it wouldn’t have been like Ian not to have documented something like that. There’s also the not-so-small matter of Nick’s past. Handing so much money over to an addict…?”
“I doubt Dad handed him the money, Freddie. More likely he just paid the bills. And he’s a former addict, not a current addict.”
“Nick himself wouldn’t say former. That’s why he takes such care about going to his meetings. But Ian wouldn’t have known that and he wouldn’t have thought former. Not with Nick’s history.”
“I suppose. But still… Nicholas stands to inherit something from Dad. Perhaps their arrangement was for him to enjoy his inheritance now, for Dad to see him enjoying it.”
Freddie didn’t look at all convinced. “D’you know he’s also been paying Mignon an allowance for years?”
“What else is he supposed to do? She’s had him by the short hairs ever since she fell at Launchy Gill. Honestly, you’d think Dad pushed her. He probably should have done.”
“The monthly payments have increased recently.”
“Cost of living?”
“What sort of cost of living does she have? And they’ve increased a lot. They’ve doubled. And there’s no way Ian would have approved of that. He had to have protested. He had to have argued not to do it at all.”
Manette considered this. She knew Freddie was right. But there were matters concerning Mignon that he’d never understood. She said, “She’s had that surgery, though. It wouldn’t have been on the NHS. Someone would have had to pay and who else besides Dad?”
“Those payments would have been made to the surgeon, wouldn’t they? These weren’t.”
“Perhaps they were made to Mignon so that she could pay the surgeon herself.”
“Then why keep making them? Why keep paying her?”
Manette shook her head. The truth was: She didn’t know.
She was silent. So was Freddie. Then he sighed and she knew something more was coming. She asked what it was. He took a slow breath.
“Whatever happened to Vivienne Tully?” he said.
She looked at him but he wasn’t looking back. He was instead focused on those two swans on the pond. She said, “I’ve absolutely no idea? Why?”
“Because for the last eight years, regular payments have gone to her as well.”
“Whatever for?”
“I haven’t a clue. But your father’s actually been bleeding money, Manette. And as far as I can tell, Ian was the only one who knew.”
CHALK FARM TO MARYLEBONE
LONDON
Barbara Havers was indulging in a snack when Angelina Upman and her daughter knocked on her door. The snack was a blueberry Pop-Tart with a side helping of cottage cheese— one needed to address at least three food groups with every meal, and this seemed to wander in the general direction of more than one food group as far as she was concerned— and Barbara crammed the rest of the pastry into her mouth before she answered the door. She could hear Hadiyyah’s excited voice outside, and it was better to look virtuous with cottage cheese rather than despicable with a Pop-Tart, she reckoned.
She was also smoking. Hadiyyah took note of this. One look past Barbara and she was tapping her foot at the sight of the fag smouldering in an ashtray on the table. She shook her head but said nothing. She looked up at her mother, the virtuous nonsmoker, as if to say, You see what I’m dealing with here?
Angelina said, “We’re messengers bearing both good news and bad news. May we come in, Barbara?”
God no, Barbara thought. She’d so far managed to keep Angelina out of her hovel and she’d intended to keep things that way. She’d not made the day bed, she’d not done the washing up, and she had five pairs of knickers drying on a line that she’d jerry-rigged over her kitchen sink. But really, how could she step outside into the November cold to see why Angelina and her daughter had appeared on her doorstep instead of doing what Angelina