The Secret Life of Evie Hamilton - Catherine Alliott [45]
‘But if not…’ Ant was saying, picking his words with care, ‘if she doesn't have her own father and she does want to see something of me – of us—’
‘Us?’ I gasped sitting up, unable to stop myself. ‘Steady, Ant, I'm not sure I can—’
‘OK,’ he agreed hastily, knowing he was going too fast. Knowing it was softly-softly with me, one small fairy step at a time. That it would be a while before ‘Eh up, Stepmam’ was something I could hear without projectile vomiting. ‘No, OK then. Just me.’
We both lay down again, uncertainly, staring up at the ceiling. Instinctively and simultaneously we reached out for each other's hands; held on tight. Later that night, we made love, and then afterwards, Ant turned over and went to sleep. I could hear his rhythmic breathing beside me, see the hump of his shoulder as it rose and fell. I lay awake for an hour, and then another hour, and finally, when I heard the longcase clock in the hall strike three, I threw another sleeping pill down my throat, knowing my mother did the same, and waited for the cosh on the head to deliver me to oblivion.
10
Wednesday morning at nine o'clock sharp, Caro was on the phone.
‘What the hell d'you think you're playing at? I've got some strange horse in my field kicking seven bells out of the children's ponies and Phil says he saw a lad unload her from a trailer at practically dawn! Said she belonged to a Mrs Hamilton and he'd been told to deliver her!’
I shut my eyes. Shit. Hadn't I rung her? I thought I'd rung her. I'd certainly left a message on Tim's mobile and had totally meant to ring her too, but so much had been going on… Bugger.
‘Caro, I – I'm terribly sorry,’ I faltered. ‘I completely forgot. I did leave Tim a message, on his mobile—’
‘Which he never bloody uses!’
‘No, well, clearly. And the boy was supposed to put her in a stable, not in with the ponies, but perhaps he forgot or – or couldn't find them, or—’
‘So she is yours?’ Caro screeched incredulously.
‘Yes, Anna and I bought her the other day. I meant to—’
‘You bought her on her own? Without taking anyone? Without ringing me? Are you totally and utterly out of your mind?’
Yes, it felt like it, recently, most of the time. But I wasn't having that. I straightened up in my kitchen. ‘Anna knows her stuff, actually,’ I said stiffly. ‘She's been riding for nearly two years now.’
‘Two years? I've been at it fifteen and I'm still learning. Where did you get her from?’
‘A very reputable dealer, as a matter of fact. He's called Lenny Docherty, and he's got a yard just off the Woodstock—’
‘Lenny the Liar!’ she said with a spectacular hiss.
‘What?’
‘You bought a horse from Lenny the Liar? Oh God, Evie, he'd sell his own grandmother!’
‘Actually,’ I said testily, but trying to fend off a certain qualm, ‘she has a very fine pedigree. She's out of Mayflower something-or-other and, um, In Your, whatsit. Dreams.’
‘She's out of some gypsy encampment off the Highbury estate, you mean. I took one look and thought, where's the caravan!’
This was so like Caro, I thought, fury mounting, to take against her simply because she hadn't been consulted. That, essentially, was what was bugging her.
‘Right, well, I'll come and sort her out then, shall I? Come and move her, if she's annoying the ponies.’
‘If you can catch her,’ Caro scoffed. ‘Phil and I have been running round after her since seven o'clock this morning. We'll have to lasso her to bring her in. And then where am I supposed to put her?’
‘Well, I—’
‘Oh, for God's sake, I'll manage. Just bring Anna over here after school, OK? I want to see her on her. Make sure she can ride the wretched thing.’
‘Right,’ I said obediently.
I put the phone down and sank my head into