Windfallen, Page 25

  "Mr. Jones."

  He could never quite bring himself to correct her. "I wasn't expecting to see you." He stooped to kiss her on the cheek.

  "That's because you've never had children."

  "What?"

  "Someone has to baby-sit."

  "Oh." He stepped in, glancing around him at the half-stripped walls, the piles of builder's debris. "Yes."

  "Things are warming up."

  "So I see."

  She turned and walked down the hallway, neatly sidestepping the empty trays of paint. "I'll tell her you're here. She's just on the phone to the plumbers."

  Jones sat on the edge of a chair and took in the half-finished drawing room, with its musty smell of drying plaster and newly repaired floor. In the corner of the room stood an aluminum pyramid of Farrow & Ball paints, while swaths of fabric ran like rivers over the back of the tatty old sofa. Arterial gulleys dissected the room, revealing where electricals had been stripped out and replaced, and on the floor a sheaf of catalogs offered light fittings in "Miami," "Austen," and "Blink."

  "That was McCarthy and his boys. They're starting on the front two bathrooms tomorrow."

  Jones looked up from the catalogs to see a woman he didn't recognize striding across the room, a mobile telephone still in hand.

  "I've told him any more delays and we start deducting money. I said we had one percent for every day lost written into the small print of the contract."

  "We do?" said Jones.

  "No. But I figured he's too lazy to actually check, and it obviously put the frighteners on him. He said he would cut short the other job he's on and be with us by nine A.M. Are we going, then?" She grabbed her wallet and keys and a large folder from a bag on the floor.

  Jones fought the urge to search the house for the girl he remembered, the rather soggy-looking one wearing shapeless old clothes and with a baby attached to her hip. This one did not look flaky and tearful. This one would not have looked out of place in his club. This one's shirt revealed a black bra and what appeared, underneath, to be a compelling pair of breasts.

  "Is there a problem?" she said, waiting. Her eyes glittered, held something that could have been challenge or aggression. Either way it made his balls tighten unexpectedly.

  "No," he said, and walked after her up the drive.

  They chose the Riviera, partly, Jones said, to suss out the opposition, but in the main because there were no pubs or bars in Merham. Those who wanted to drink socially did so at the hotel or at one of the two licensed restaurants in the town, or they went farther afield. In normal circumstances--or as much as any of her circumstances could be considered normal at the moment--Daisy would have felt pretty uncomfortable going in there at all. But something about the evening, and her red chiffon blouse, and the fact that she knew she had already unbalanced Jones, for all his bluff and bluster, made Daisy bullish, so that she positively sauntered when they walked together into the bar.

  "Can I see your wine list?"

  Jones leaned his considerable bulk on the bar. It was staffed by a pale, pustular young man who barely filled his shirt collar and broke off his whispered conversation with a giggling waitress with barely concealed irritation. There were two other couples in the bar, one elderly, contentedly gazing out at the sea in silence, the other, possibly business partners, arguing over some figures on a pad.

  Daisy gazed around her at the room, with its French windows and sea views, as Jones muttered at the wine list. The sun was setting, but there was nothing to transform the bar into a place where one might want to snuggle up and listen to the sea as it darkened to ink. In fact, it could have been a beautiful room, were it not frilled and fancied to within an inch of its life. The same apricotthemed floral material occurred everywhere: on the curtains, pelmets, seat coverings, even surrounding the plant pots. The tables were white overwrought iron. It looked less like a bar than a tearoom. Then, thought Daisy, gazing at the clientele, it probably sold more tea than alcohol.

  "Seventeen quid for the equivalent of Blue Nun," murmured Jones as she turned back to him. "No wonder it's not exactly buzzing in here. Sorry, did you want wine?"

  "No," Daisy lied. "But it'll do." She fought the urge to light up a cigarette. It would have somehow given him the moral advantage.

  They seated themselves at a corner table. Jones sat at an angle to her, poured them both a glass of wine, and then occasionally studied her from the corner of his eye, as if trying to work something out.

  "Awful decor in here," she said.

  He didn't bother looking up. "First place I came when I originally viewed the house. I wanted to see what was on offer. People who decorated it ought to be shot."

  "Smothered with floral cushions."

  He raised an eyebrow.

  Daisy looked back down at her drink. So he was not in the mood for a joke. Sod him. She thought briefly of Ellie, wondering if she was sleeping through for Mrs. Bernard. Then she pushed the thought aside and took a long sip of her wine.

  "I guess you know why I'm here," he said eventually.

  "No," she lied again.

  He sighed. Looked at his hand. "I've not been entirely happy about the way things have been going up here."

  "No, nor have I," she interrupted. "In fact, I'd say it's only in the last few days that we've got back on track. By the end of the week I reckon we'll have made up our lost ground."

  "But it's not really good enough--"

  "No. You're right. And I've told the builders that I'm not happy."

  "It's not just the builders--"

  "No, I know. It's been the plumbers as well. But they're sorted now, as I told you. And I think I should be able to work a bit off their bill, too, so we may come in under budget."

  He was silent for a minute. "You're not going to make this easy for me, are you?"

  "No."

  They stared at each other, unblinking for a minute. Daisy was very still. She had never held out on anyone like this, even Daniel. She had always been the one to capitulate, the one to smooth things over. It was the way she was made.

  She held her breath.

  "I can't afford to let this get behind, Daisy. There's a lot riding on it."

  "For me, too."

  He rubbed at his forehead, thinking. "I don't know. . . ." he muttered. And then again. "I don't know."

  Then, suddenly, unexpectedly, he raised his glass.

  "Ah, hell. Seeing as you have evidently acquired a pair of balls since we last met, I guess I'll have to hang on to mine. For the time being." He waited for her to pick up her glass, then clashed them together. "Right. God help us. Don't let me down."

  For a bottle of gnat's piss, as Jones delicately put it, it seemed to go down remarkably easily. For Daisy, who had drunk nothing stronger than Orangina since giving birth, the raw kick of alcohol seemed to signify a welcome return to her old self, an indicator that there was another Daisy waiting to reemerge.

  It also made her swiftly drunk, so that she forgot to be inhibited by the man opposite and began to treat him as she would have treated any man before Ellie's birth. She tried to flirt with him.

  "So what's your real name?" she said as he ordered a second bottle.

  "Jones."

  "Your first name."

  "I don't use my first name."

  "How . . . modern of you."

  "You mean how pretentious." He grunted.

  "No. Well, yes. It is a bit, though, just giving yourself one name. Like Madonna?"

  "You try growing up in South Wales with a Christian name like Inigo. And see where it gets you."

  Daisy almost spit out her drink. "You're kidding!" she said. "Inigo Jones?"

  "My mother was very keen on architecture. She said I was conceived at the Wilton House in the West Country. Problem was, they've since decided that Inigo Jones didn't even design the bloody thing. His nephew did."

  "What was he called?"

  "Webb. James Webb."

  "Webb," she tried it out. "Webby. No, it
doesn't have quite the same ring to it."

  "No."

  "Ah. Oh, well, at least it explains why you've got such good taste in buildings." She was shameless. But someone was going to bloody like her. If it killed her.

  He looked up at her from under lowered brows. One of them may have raised.

  "It's going to be fabulous," she said determinedly.

  "It'd better be." Jones leaned his head back and emptied his glass. "And it won't be if you insist on having those new windows made by hand. I had a closer look at those figures yesterday. It's too much for bathroom windows."

  Daisy looked up sharply. "But they have to be handmade."

  "Why? Who's going to be looking at a bathroom window?"

  "It's not that. It's the style, for the house. It's particular. You're not going to pick them up in Magnet and Southern Window Manufacturers."

  "I'm not paying for handmade."

  "You agreed to the costs. You okayed them several weeks ago."

  "Yes, well, I hadn't had time to look at the small print."

  "You're making it sound like I was trying to deceive you."

  "Don't be so melodramatic. I've just had a closer look, and I can't see why I'm paying for handmade windows in a place where no one's going to be looking at them anyway."

  The faintest hint of warmth in their mood rapidly evaporated. Daisy knew it and knew that she should back off in order to save it. But she couldn't help herself. The windows were important. "You okayed them."

  "Oh, come on, Daisy. Change the record. We're supposed to be working in partnership. It's not going to work if you start bleating on about keeping things to the letter."

  "No, it's not going to work if you start going back on things you've already agreed to."

  Jones sighed heavily. He reached inside his jacket and pulled out a packet of tablets, popping two into his mouth.

  "I take it you weren't the entertainment and hospitality half of your partnership."

  Daisy was stung. She stared at him, her voice icy and level. "Yes, well, you didn't hire me for my interpersonal skills."

  There was a long silence.

  "Ah, come on. I can't face bickering like this. Let's go and get something to eat. I never yet found a woman I could argue with on a full stomach."

  Daisy bit her tongue.

  "Okay, Daisy. You know the area. You take me somewhere nice. Somewhere you think I might like."

  ARCADIA'S TERRACES FOLDED OUT IN STEPS, THEIR BLEAK angles softened by the overgrown shrubs around them, their paved floors illuminated by the soft light from the windows. Below, on the sea path, people strolled by, on their way down to or home from the beach, barely noticing the brutal building above them.

  "House looks good from here," said Jones, shoveling a handful of chips into his mouth. "Always good to see it from another angle."

  "Yes."

  "Not quite the angle I expected, admittedly."

  He was not, she observed as they sat on the seawall, the most cheerful of men. But fed, watered, and headache-free, he was at least less confrontational company. She found herself working to make him laugh, forcing him to admire her. Men who gave nothing up always affected her like that.

  Daniel was his polar opposite; he let all his feelings show--his neediness, his passion, his explosive temper--and she'd been the one to hold back. Until Ellie, that was. Everything was until Ellie. Daisy looked at the light across the bay, at the house where her child (she hoped) lay sleeping, and wondered, not for the first time, what would have happened if they'd never had her.

  Would he have stayed? Or would something else have ended up driving him away?

  She shifted slightly, conscious that the cold of the seawall was seeping through the seat of her trousers. She was drunk, she realized, and beginning to get maudlin. She pushed herself a little upright, trying to pull herself together.

  "Have you got children?"

  He finished his chips, rolled the paper into a ball, and put it beside him. "Me? No."

  "Never been married?"

  "Yes, but no kids, thank goodness. It was enough of a disaster without them. Those fish and chips were good. Haven't had skate for years."

  Daisy was silent. She looked straight down at the sea, lost for a second in the gentle lapping of the waves.

  It took her some moments to realize he was looking at her.

  "So what happened to you?"

  "What?"

  "I'm assuming it wasn't immaculate. . . ."

  "What? Oh, er, no. The old story, I suppose. Boy meets girl, girl has baby, boy decides he's having an early midlife crisis and buggers off into the sunset."

  He laughed. He couldn't help himself. Daisy didn't know whether to feel pleased or to berate herself for having reduced her life's tragedy into a comic sound bite.

  "Actually, that's not fair," she found herself saying. "He's just having a difficult time at the moment. I don't want to . . . I mean, he's a good person. I think he's just a bit confused. A lot of men find it difficult, don't they? The whole adjustment thing?"

  A dog appeared out of the darkness, sniffing at Jones's empty wrappings. The voice of his owner, walking along the sea path behind them, called him away.

  "He was the man you ran your business with? Daniel, was it?"

  "That's the one."

  Jones shrugged. Looked out to sea. "That's tough."

  "It's more than tough." The bitterness that crept into her voice surprised even her.

  There was a lengthy silence.

  Daisy shivered in the evening air, wrapping her arms around her. The chiffon shirt was not the warmest of tops.

  Jones turned to face her. "Still . . . ," he said, his face breaking into a tender smile, only partially visible in the moonlight. Daisy looked back at him and felt her heart leap into her mouth as his hand reached out.

  And pinched one of her untouched chips.

  "You're doing okay. Looks like you're doing okay."

  He stood, hauled her to her feet. "C'mon, Daisy Parsons, let's get another drink."

  MRS. BERNARD ALREADY HAD HER COAT ON WHEN THEY arrived back at the house, Jones tripping over two piles of rubble in the hallway.

  "I heard you coming down the drive," she said. "Nice time, was it?"

  "Very . . . productive," said Jones. "Very productive, wasn't it, Daisy?"

  "I bet your business meetings in London don't involve fish and chips and sitting on people's walls," said Daisy. The second bottle of wine had gone from being an extremely bad idea to an entirely necessary one.

  "And alcohol," said Mrs. Bernard, eyeing them both.

  "Oh, no," said Jones. "They always involve wine. But not"--here he and Daisy looked at each other and both began to giggle--"Blue Nun."

  "For someone who thought it was so grim, you did drink an awful lot of it," Daisy said.

  Jones shook his head, as if trying to clear it. "You know, for a crap wine, it's got some alcohol content. I actually feel a bit drunk."

  "You look drunk," said Mrs. Bernard. She may have even looked disapproving. Daisy was beyond caring.

  "But I don't get drunk. I never get drunk."

  "Ah," said Daisy, holding a finger aloft. "You don't get drunk--unless you eat lots of headache pills at the same time. Then you probably get very drunk."

  "Oh, Christ . . ." Jones rummaged around in his trouser pockets and pulled out a packet. "'Not to be taken with alcohol.'"

  Mrs. Bernard had disappeared. Daisy sat down heavily on the chair, wondering if she'd gone up to Ellie. She hoped Ellie wasn't crying; she wasn't entirely sure she'd make it up the stairs.

  "I'll make you a coffee," she said. And struggled to get herself out of the seat.

  "I'll be off, then," said Mrs. Bernard, who had reappeared in the doorway. "See you soon, Mr. Jones. Daisy."

  "It's . . . er . . . yes, yes, Mrs. Bernard. Thanks again. I'll see you out."

  The door closed quietly. A moment later Jones walked back into the room, and the two of them looked at each o
ther, Daisy suddenly acutely aware of this man's presence. She hadn't been alone with a man since . . . since the police officer had driven her car over Hammersmith Bridge. And that had made her cry.

  The room still smelled of drying plaster, the sofa in the middle of the room was covered in dust sheets, and a single lightbulb provided the room's only light. For a building site, it was suddenly uncomfortably intimate.

  "You okay?" he said. His voice was low, his smile gentle.

  "Fine. I'll make the coffee," she said, and on the third attempt managed to stand.

  Almost half of it had sluiced out of the cup between the kitchens and the drawing room, but Jones did not seem to notice that his was a rather meager drink.

  "I can't find my car keys," he said, swaying slightly and repeatedly patting his pockets, as if they might suddenly reappear. "Could have sworn I put them on that table when we came in."

  Daisy cast around the room, trying to keep the horizontals from swimming up and unbalancing her. She'd felt progressively less stable during her time out of the room, during which her anxiety about Jones's increasing attractiveness had been firmly overtaken by anxiety about her continued ability to stay upright.

  "I haven't seen them." She put the cup down on a paint-splattered packing case.

  "We didn't take the car out, did we?"

  "You know we didn't. We passed it in the drive as we came back in. You stroked it, remember?"

  "That's middle age for you," he muttered. "You start seeing beauty in your car. It'll be leather jackets next."

  "And hair dye. And prepubescent girlfriends."

  He'd been a bit quiet after that.

  Daisy left him searching the room while she tried to locate her mobile phone, which, she eventually realized, was ringing in her jacket. No one would ring this late. Unless it was Daniel. She flung her jacket around, trying to get into the right pocket, feeling curiously fearful as she did so that Daniel might guess she had a man in the house.

  "Hello?"

  "It's me."

  Daisy's face fell.

  "You can tell Mr. Jones that I'll bring his car keys back tomorrow. I didn't think it was a good idea for him to drive, and I didn't think you were in a position to tell him. Working for him and all."

  She slid down the wall, the phone only half to her ear.

  "I'll be around about eightish. Ellie's bottles are made up in the fridge."