I do!’ Leigh protested, glancing at the reflection of the child in the mirror and grinning. ‘OK. I give in. Hardly ever. I just thought that this might make a nice change. What do you think?’
She twirled on the spot, holding one corner of the flowing red and black skirt between her fingers.
‘You look beautiful,’ Amy said honestly, and Leigh could have hugged her. ‘Are you meeting someone?’
‘Oh, you know, the usual.’ She shrugged and smiled vaguely. ‘What are you going to be doing in school today?’ she asked, changing the subject.
‘Maths, science, sports.’ Their eyes met and Leigh smiled.
‘Have you had the results of that test you had last week?’
‘We get them today,’ Amy said glumly.
‘We can treat ourselves to a burger and a milkshake after school if you do OK,’ Leigh said. A rare indulgence, she thought, and Amy deserved it. When times had been good she had had as many burgers and milkshakes as she could have eaten, and now that times were rocky she hadn’t complained once about what she was now missing. She had just adapted, in that curious, malleable way children had, accepting their straitened circumstances without complaint.
‘What if I do badly?’ Amy asked with concern.
‘Well, we’ll treat ourselves anyway. Consolation prize, so to speak.’ By four this afternoon, Leigh thought, I’ll be in much the same boat myself. Whether things go well or not, I’ll be just so damn relieved that a burger and milkshake will be just the thing.
‘Anyway,’ Leigh told her niece, as an afterthought, ‘it doesn’t matter whether you pass or fail that comprehension test, just so long as you put all your efforts into trying.’
‘That’s what Mrs Spencer keeps telling us.’
‘Well, there you go, then. We can’t both be wrong, can we?’ She turned to the little figure on the bed and grinned reassuringly. What she saw, though, wasn’t Amy sitting on the bed with folded legs, but Amy in the future, bombarded by revelations that would redefine the whole contours of her life.
She slipped the long-sleeved woollen turtleneck over her head and only inspected herself again when they were about to leave the house.
She looked, she decided, reasonably all right—neat and combed, at any rate, which for her made a change, and for once colour co-ordinated—black and red skirt, black, clingy turtleneck just showing under the black jumper, black coat because although it was only the end of October the weather was unseasonably cold and flat black shoes. Sober attire, she reflected. Highly appropriate, given the mission in hand.
Her first stop was to drop Amy off at school, then there was an hour and a half during which time she knew that she would simply freefall in a fever of apprehension. She had never been as strong and assertive as her sister. Jenny had always protected her from unsavoury problems, and it had only been in the last sixteen months or so that she had begun to show her own strengths.
Of course, it was the uncertainty which was gnawing away at her. She knew that. That and the knowledge that everything depended on her. The whole of Amy’s future rested on her shoulders because there were no other relatives to fall back on—no conveniently placed grandparents who could help out, no aunts and uncles to tide them over. Leigh had never missed the presence of a family as much as she did now.
It wasn’t even as though she had a boyfriend to lean on, someone to give her strength when she felt her own failing. True, there had been someone. Sensitive, moody, artistic Mick, with his long hair tied back into a ponytail and his enviable contempt for the bourgeoisie, but that hadn’t lasted. It seemed that he was also allergic to responsibility. The thought of helping her to share the strain of bringing up a young child had been just a little too much like hard work for him. ‘I’m a free soul,’ he had told her. ‘Can’t be tied down.’ And that had been that. Leigh couldn’t think about it, without feeling the sour taste of bitterness in her mouth.
It took her ages to find the club, which was about as far from the Underground as it could be, and as she couldn’t afford the luxury of a taxi she had to walk the distance, getting lost several times along the way, despite her A to Z.
She was feeling quite frazzled by the time she stood outside the club, which resembled a large Georgianfronted house more than anything else.
Her legs, which had covered the distance on autopilot, now seemed to be nailed to the pavement outside. She literally couldn’t move a muscle, couldn’t take a step forward. She just stood there, a small, motionless figure amidst a throng of pedestrians, with her hair blowing in every direction as she looked nervously at the edifice. The cold October air pinched her cheeks, turning them rosy, and made her eyes smart.
It was only when she felt the chill
Inside was like stepping into another world. Leigh caught her breath and gazed around her in a disoriented fashion. Everything was so subdued. There was no noise. It was as though the twentieth century was something that was happening outside, something that was abandoned once the doors had closed behind her.
The furnishings were lavish, though faded, with the sort of well-worn elegance she associated with country mansions which had been handed down through the generations.
She looked a little wildly around her, feeling thoroughly out of place in what she was wearing. Her carefully co-ordinated outfit was frankly a joke in a place like this. She raked her fingers through her short hair in a nervous gesture, and then summoned up her courage to start looking for the dining room.
She wasn’t allowed to get very far.
A middle-aged man materialised in front of her and asked, pointedly, whether she was a member.
‘No, but—’
‘This establishment,’ he said, eyeing her up and down and clearly finding her wanting, ‘is not open to the public. I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave.’ He looked like the sort who disapproved of women in general, having access to the club, members or not. The fact that she was not obviously reduced her to the status of the undeserving. He placed his hand on her elbow and Leigh sprang back angrily.
‘Wait just a minute!’
‘Now, miss,’ the gimlet-eyed man said, his voice hardening, ‘I hope I’m not going to have any trouble from you.’
And vice versa, Leigh thought acidly, but she forced herself to remain calm.
‘I have an appointment to meet someone here,’ she said coolly, bristling as he threw her a dubious look.
‘And might I ask whom?’
‘A Nicholas Kendall.’
The name was enough to bring about a complete transformation. The man deigned to smile, stiff though the smile was.
‘Of course, Miss...?’
‘Walker.’
‘Miss Walker. Ah. If you
