The Way We Were_ A Novel - Marcia Willett [68]
Nearly a week after Pete has gone, Julia comes downstairs one morning looking so happy that Tiggy stops putting out bowls and spoons and looks at her curiously Julia grins back at her.
‘Guess what?’ she says – and when Tiggy shakes her head, bemused, she says, ‘I'm pregnant.’
‘Oh, Julia!’ Tiggy runs round the table to embrace her. ‘Oh, that's fantastic. Are you certain?’
‘Well, I've missed two months and you know how regular I am. It's crazy really, I suppose, but we decided we'd like another little girl.’
‘It's wonderful,’ says Tiggy warmly. ‘A friend for Claerwen.’
Julia laughs. ‘It'll probably be another boy Don't say anything to anyone yet.’
‘Of course I shan't. Do you feel sick or anything?’
‘I feel wonderful,’ Julia says firmly.
A few days later, Angela drops in unannounced on her way to Rock. (‘If only she'd let us know that she was coming,’ fumes Julia. ‘But that's the whole point,’ answers Tiggy. ‘To catch us unawares.’) The twins with unfeigned reluctance take Cat out to see the tent whilst Angela sits down at the kitchen table, accepts coffee, lights a cigarette and offers the packet to Julia.
‘You're looking very well,’ she says, looking at her critically.
‘Am I?’ asks Julia casually – but she can't prevent the flush that stains her cheeks as she refuses the cigarette. ‘Thanks, but not just now,’ she says.
Angela raises her eyebrows; her narrow, sharp eyes amused. ‘Don't tell me you're in pig,’ she says lightly She laughs at Julia's vexed expression. ‘Don't worry’ she says. ‘I shan't tell. Goodness, Pete is such a baby-maker, isn't he?’
It is a coincidence that Cat should come in at that moment, sidling under her mother's arm, so that Angela's gaze should fall upon the child's head as the remark hangs in the air between them all. In the strained silence they can hear Charlie crying in the garden and Julia gets up without a word and goes out.
Cat removes her fingers from her mouth. ‘Charlie's a crybaby,’ she says, staring at Tiggy with her cross-eyed, inimical look.
Tiggy experiences the familiar sense of dislike and even fear, as if the child is some kind of threat, and her baby moves suddenly within her as if warning her of danger. Instinctively, she places her hands over her bump and Angela glances at her.
‘Poor you,’ she says. ‘You look as if you might pop at any minute. Gosh, you must feel vulnerable. Just between you and me, I know this dit you're putting around, but your baby isn't Pete's too, is it? People are beginning to wonder. You know; the three of you all so cosy here together.’
Tiggy shoves back her chair so sharply that the Turk growls but neither Angela nor Cat flinch: they simply stare at her, coolly calculating what she might do next.
She swallows down her anger, catches at her temper. ‘You're wasting your time, you know,’ she says as calmly as she can, and follows Julia into the garden.
Presently Angela comes out with Cat and waves her car keys.
‘Must get on,’ she calls, ‘or we'll be late,’ and they drive away, leaving Julia still kneeling, comforting the sobbing Charlie whilst the twins keep up their furious duet.
‘She pushed him over …’ ‘She pushed him really hard, Mummy …’ ‘We hate her, don't we, Liv?’ ‘Yes, we really hate her … Don't cry, Charlie …’
Julia looks up at Tiggy: all her happiness has fled and her face looks pinched and drawn.
‘It's not true,’ Tiggy says urgently but quietly, so that the twins won't hear. ‘It's simply not true. She's just suggested the same thing about me. That my baby is Pete's. She's crazy.’
‘She actually said that?’ Julia stares up at her, distracted briefly from her own terrible suspicions.
‘She hates you. And me, for some reason. She's mad. You simply mustn't take any notice of her.’
The twins barge round, talking to Charlie, telling their story again, and Julia stands up with Charlie in her arms. His knees are scraped and bleeding a little and he has earth on his cheek;