Secret Keeping for Beginners Read online

  ‘This food is fantastic,’ he was saying. ‘It’s so healthy, without making you suffer for it. I can feel the goodness spreading into my bones.’

  No wonder Rachel was so gorgeous, he thought, if she’d been brought up on this grub.

  ‘What kind of food did you grow up on?’ asked Joy.

  Simon was nonplussed for a moment. Had he just said that out loud, what he’d been thinking about Rachel? Or was it simply an obvious thing for Joy to ask in the context? He really didn’t know.

  ‘Well, I went to boarding school and the food there was horrendous and there was never enough of it and we did so much sport, we were always hungry. We used to go into the town sometimes and shoplift food. I was lucky not to come out of that place with a criminal record to go with my A levels.’

  ‘What about in the holidays?’ asked Joy, putting a piece of cucumber into her mouth with her fingers and watching his face closely. ‘Did you get better food at home?’

  Simon laughed, but in a rather brittle way, his easy manner gone. ‘Oh, yes,’ he said, feeling himself tense, ‘it was always a great relief to get back to some home cooking.’

  Images were flashing into his head. Things he didn’t want to think about. Three overexcited boys, so happy to be arriving home from school for the holidays. Always a lavish afternoon tea ready to greet them. Piles of egg and cress sandwiches, scones, a fruit cake. Fighting over the toasted almonds on the top …

  He made his brain lock the memories away again and looked round. There was plenty to distract him. Rachel hadn’t been kidding about the extent of the murals, every inch of the room was painted with trees, creepers, flowers and foliage spreading up the walls, over the ceiling and down onto the edges of the wooden floor. Normally he’d be horrified to see lovely old parquet besmirched like that, but the painting was so well done, it looked amazing.

  ‘I take it this is Tessa’s work,’ he said to Joy, gesturing at the walls with his free hand, as he lifted a large forkful of roast beetroot, rocket and goat cheese salad up to his mouth.

  Subject change, thought Joy.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘it’s almost an addiction for Tessa now, I think. She just has to get the creative urge out. Rachel says if you stand still too long in this house, Tessa will paint some ivy up your leg.’

  Simon smiled. That was such a Rachel comment.

  ‘Well, it looks extraordinary,’ said Simon. ‘It’s like sitting inside a magical forest. I’ve seen her work before. She did a friend’s dining room about twenty years ago and I’ve so enjoyed it, all that time. I’m looking forward to meeting her.’

  ‘I think it’s a shame Tessa doesn’t do it professionally any more,’ said Joy.

  ‘That’s exactly what I said to Rachel earlier,’ said Simon, ‘but she didn’t think Tessa would be interested.’

  Really? thought Joy. How odd.

  ‘I think Tessa is just too modest to suggest she’d like to,’ she said.

  ‘Well, there’s a massive market for this kind of work in London right now,’ said Simon. ‘All those multi-million-pound houses that need lavish decorating, so I think I might suggest it anyway.’

  Joy smiled at him and raised her glass of water in a toast. ‘You do that, Simon,’ she said.

  Rachel found Natasha sitting at one of the Lawn & Stone garden tables on the terrace at the back of the house. She was locked in an animated whispered conversation with a woman Rachel didn’t know.

  A few yards away, Tessa was perched on the edge of the rope egg chair, with Tom standing next to her, one hand on the top of the chair. Five people were looking at them. Tessa’s face had the expression of a trapped stoat.

  ‘That’s great,’ the photographer was saying, ‘just lift your head up a bit, Tessa. Not just your eyes, your chin as well. Look towards me. Good. Can you relax your shoulders a little?’

  ‘Boo,’ Rachel whispered into Natasha’s ear.

  ‘Rachie!’ replied Natasha, ‘I got your text, but then I forgot you were coming down early. Oops, I didn’t tell Mum, sorry. Sit down. This is Mattie. I’ve been helping her with the make-up.’

  ‘She means I’ve been assisting her,’ said Mattie, smiling broadly.

  ‘Well, the magazine had booked Mattie for the job, but she’s been very understanding about Tessa wanting me to do it,’ said Natasha.

  Rachel smiled at them both and then glanced over at the knot of people around the egg chair. The photographer was now trying the shot with Tessa standing up and Tom sitting in the chair. She still looked like she was standing in front of a firing squad.

  ‘Has she been like this the whole time?’ Rachel asked Natasha, trying not to laugh, as the photographer abandoned that idea and was wondering whether they could both fit in the chair together.

  ‘Pretty much,’ said Natasha. ‘The only time I’ve seen her relax was when they took a shot of her in front of the floral mural in the drawing room, and I went over under cover of powdering her off and told her you couldn’t really see her in the shot, because her dress and hair blended in with the wall.’

  Rachel convulsed with laughter, her shoulders shaking, her head in her hands.

  ‘That poor photographer,’ she said.

  ‘I know,’ said Natasha, ‘I’ve worked on shoots with animals that were easier to photograph than Tessa. I’ve tried all the tricks I use on sulky models and nothing’s worked. I’ve given her a neck massage and everything, haven’t I, Mattie?’

  She nodded. ‘And she’s so beautiful, your sister,’ she said. ‘Why is she so uptight about having her picture taken?’

  ‘No idea,’ said Rachel. ‘She’s always been weird about it. We’ve hardly got any pictures of the three of us as kids, because she’d run away as soon as she saw a camera. Which was pretty sad, considering Natasha’s dad is an amazing photographer.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Mattie, nodding enthusiastically, ‘Anthony Younger. I love his work.’

  ‘Mattie’s from Melbourne,’ said Natasha.

  ‘Aha, great. I thought I heard a bit of a familiar lilt,’ said Rachel. ‘G’day, Matt.’

  ‘G’day, Rach,’ said Mattie, grinning.

  ‘I thought you said your “boss” was coming with you,’ said Natasha.

  ‘I’ve left him with Mum,’ said Rachel, pulling a face. ‘It feels a bit weird having him here. I want to get rid of him as soon as I can.’

  Natasha just raised her eyebrows and said nothing. She wasn’t getting involved in that one. Rachel was like a belligerent schoolgirl about work sometimes, it was always her against ‘them’ in an oddly immature way.

  Rachel was so good at what she did, Natasha didn’t understand why she didn’t start her own agency. Rather than wasting her energy angsting about the ‘boss’, she should be the bloody boss. It was so unlike Rachel not to go for it, but maybe with the girls to consider, she just thought it was too risky. Damn shame. It was different for her, she only had herself to think about. Fortunately and unfortunately.

  Rachel was looking over at the shoot again. The photographer had turned away from Tom and Tessa and was in deep discussion with the art director. This was the crucial shot for her product. That chair was so photogenic – she’d had an amazing response to the snap she’d taken of it on Instagram – and she couldn’t let the photographer give up on it. If they got this picture right it might end up on the cover of the magazine. Time to step in.

  ‘I think I might go over and see if I can move things along a bit,’ she said to Natasha.

  ‘Want back-up?’ asked Natasha, feeling guilty that she’d been so engrossed in conversation with Mattie, she hadn’t been giving Tessa enough support.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Rachel, ‘I think we need to do our sister act, chill her down a bit, make her laugh. Tea might be a good place to start actually …’

  ‘Mattie,’ said Natasha, standing up and consciously putting her professional head on again, ‘would you mind making Tessa some tea? There’s Earl Grey in the cupboard above the kettle. She lik
es it weak, not much milk, no sugar.’

  ‘Sure,’ said Mattie and headed for the kitchen.

  Rachel and Natasha locked eyes.

  ‘Let’s do this,’ said Rachel.

  Natasha nodded and the two of them headed over towards the group.

  ‘Hey, Tessie,’ said Rachel in a sing-song voice, like she’d just strolled in, ‘how’s it all going?’

  ‘Hi, Rachel,’ said Tessa, her face lighting up when she saw her two sisters walking towards her. She felt like the cavalry had arrived.

  ‘Hi, Tom,’ said Rachel, then she walked over to the photographer, putting out her hand. ‘Hi, I’m Rachel Lambton, Tessa’s sister. Just come to give her some moral support, hope I’m not interrupting. Do you mind if I watch?’

  Rachel played for time, introducing herself to the whole crew, until she saw Mattie emerging with the tea. She took it from her and went over to Tessa, handing her the mug.

  ‘Here you are,’ she said.

  ‘Oh, thanks, Rachel,’ said Tessa. ‘Just what I needed. This has been hell,’ she whispered.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said Rachel, ‘I was looking at the set-up just now and from where the photographer’s standing it’s clear he’s really only focusing on Tom, and with your dark hair and the shadows from the trees, you just kind of blend into the background. I could hardly see you. I wasn’t even sure you were in the picture.’

  The look of relief on Tessa’s face was so palpable, Rachel knew she had to act quickly.

  ‘And I think this is the last shot they need you to be in, the rest are just of Tom,’ she said, making it up as she went along, ‘then we can go inside and have some lunch.’

  With that, she practically hopped back to the photographer and spoke quietly to him, her back to Tessa.

  ‘You’ve got a very short window of normal with her, while she drinks the tea,’ she said. ‘Then you’ll be back to the traumatised rabbit face.’

  He looked at her for a moment, glanced over at Tessa, then turned back to Rachel and nodded, smiling. ‘Nice one,’ he said.

  ‘And don’t give her any direct instructions, if you can avoid it,’ added Rachel. ‘Pretend you’re a wildlife photographer and she’s a nervous endangered lemur …’

  ‘Cool,’ said the photographer, his camera raised, already shooting.

  Happy with her mug of tea, Tessa didn’t even notice it was happening, but Tom did, sitting on the edge of the chair, his now famous cheeky chimney-sweep grin on full-beam, putting his head from one side to the other, like the pro he had become.

  Rachel took her place next to Natasha, behind the crew.

  ‘You’re a bloody genius, Rachel Lambton,’ said Natasha, under her breath. ‘I wish I had you on some of my fashion shoots.’

  ‘I just want my chair on the cover of that magazine,’ said Rachel.

  Cranbrook, 5.47 p.m.

  Going back into the house to get a shawl for her mother, as the first hint of evening chill settled on the garden, Rachel heard some very strange noises coming from the room which Tessa, rather pretentiously, Rachel thought, called ‘the library’.

  ‘Howzat!’ a male voice called out, after a loud crash like a pile of deck chairs falling over.

  She peeped round the door to see Simon, jacket off, shirt sleeves rolled up, high-fiving her middle nephew Archie, while Daisy skipped about in a victory dance.

  ‘Way to go, Simbo,’ Archie was saying. ‘That was a full strike, making it four, two to us.’

  ‘No way,’ Finn butted in. ‘Ari kicked two of them over … so they don’t count. That bowl is null.’

  Equally fascinated and alarmed, Rachel quickly pulled back behind the door before any of them saw her and spied on the scene through the crack of the hinges.

  ‘Friendly fire, Finn, my man,’ Simon was saying, his hands spread out in an innocent gesture. ‘They would have gone down with the others anyway, Ari just got there before I did … but if you’re not happy, I’ll take my turn again. Not a problem.’

  ‘OK,’ said Finn, ‘let’s make it the best of five.’

  After two cartwheels, which generously displayed her bright pink knickers to the room, Daisy was doing high kicks, clapping her hands underneath the raised leg.

  ‘That’s all right, that’s OK, we’re gonna beat you anyway …’ she sang.

  Rachel turned round and leaned against the door, her eyes closed. She hadn’t seen Simon since he’d gone off with Tom and the photographer for a tour of the salvage yard after the shoot, while she’d been chatting up the magazine’s art director and covering the Lawn & Stone furniture with plastic sheets so it wouldn’t get damaged before it was collected. She’d been rather hoping he might already have left.

  But here he still was and hanging out with the kids, of all things. That was so bonkers – everyone in the office knew he couldn’t be bothered with children – and potentially disastrous, considering her two were among them. Daisy was capable of anything.

  It was nearly six now, on a Friday. The working week was officially over, didn’t he know it was time to naff off? Surely he’d soon tire of the company of a super-attitudinal adolescent, two gawky younger boys, a very mouthy nine-year-old girl and a junior goodie-goodie? But with his triumphant shout on scoring another full strike, without Ari’s accidental help this time, she wasn’t so sure.

  She wondered if she should just barge in and order the girls upstairs to change out of their school uniforms, breaking up the party, but when she turned back to peep through the door crack again he was helping Daisy get into the correct bowling crouch and she looked so happy she just couldn’t do it. She’d have to find another tactic to send Simon – Simbo! – Rathbone on his merry way.

  ‘Bravo, Daisy-Day! Ten men down …’ she heard him cry out, after another loud crash of skittles, and she nipped across the hall and up the stairs, before anyone could see her.

  Simon wasn’t thinking about anything. His only concern was to win the game, irrespective of the fact that the combined age of his team was double that of the other one, as a result of his forty-seven years. In that extraordinary room, where painted wide-eyed animals appeared to peep out of the bookshelves, the only thing that mattered to him was knocking wooden skittles to the ground.

  Sport had always affected him that way. Reducing him to bone, muscle, hand and eye, and the sheer determination to beat the other bastard. It was why he’d always loved it so much. When there was a game to win, whoever it was against, nothing else troubled his mind. He’d even forgotten about Rachel.

  Coming back downstairs with her mother’s shawl, a beautiful mirrored and embroidered Indian thing she’d had for years, Rachel was happy to find Tessa in the kitchen, making jugs of cordial.

  ‘My boss is still here,’ Rachel hissed at her. ‘He’s playing skittles with the kids, in your library.’

  Tessa smiled. ‘I can hear them,’ she said, as another cheer rang out. ‘Sounds like they’re having a great time.’

  ‘But I want him to go,’ said Rachel.

  ‘Why?’ said Tessa. ‘Mum’s invited him to stay for dinner. She says I know him … do I?’

  ‘Mum’s done what?’ said Rachel, too appalled to answer Tessa’s question.

  ‘She’s invited him to stay for dinner. It would have been rude not to.’

  ‘Did he say yes?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Tessa, getting irritated.

  Couldn’t Rachel ever relax? It’s not like she’d had to shop for the dinner, with special catering for several picky children, get the table laid and cleaned up afterwards, or make endless jugs of drinks for people.

  ‘Go and ask her,’ she added. ‘She’s entertaining the magazine people. That’s who I’m making all this for. They’re finally finished.’

  ‘Didn’t she ask them to stay for dinner as well?’ said Rachel.

  ‘She did, actually,’ said Tessa, now rolling her eyes to match her sister. ‘I’m happy to say they declined, but she was right to do it, I can see that.’<
br />
  Although I never would have, she thought. She wished they’d all go, the whole damn lot of them. Everyone. She loved seeing her sisters, but with so many other people there as well it was just too much. She had a headache already.

  Rachel saw the strain on Tessa’s face. She had the perfect house for it, but entertaining large numbers had never been her thing. Even when she had their seventy-four-year-old mother to do the food and everyone else to help, it seemed to be too much for her.

  Rachel felt a flash of irritation. Tessa should hire proper caterers if she couldn’t handle the pressure, it wasn’t like they couldn’t afford it and Tom could claim it as a tax deduction. ‘TV’s Tim Chiminey and his wife, Tessa, entertaining at their charming artistic home.’

  But seeing Tessa’s hand go up to her temple – she’d always suffered from migraines – sisterly affection won out. And she did owe her for having the Lawn & Stone furniture in the shots.

  ‘Let me do that for you,’ she said, putting out her hand to take the knife Tessa was using to cut orange slices. ‘Go upstairs and have a breather, you’ve had a full-on day.’

  ‘Really?’ said Tessa, her face brightening, ‘I am feeling a bit whacked and there’s going to be at least twelve for dinner, so it would be great to have a bit of time out before that.’

  ‘It’s fine, I’ll take over on the drinks and I’ll send word up to you when it’s time to eat.’

  ‘Oh, thanks, Rach,’ said Tessa, kissing her cheek and practically running from the room.

  Twelve for dinner? Rachel did a mental tally and even including Branko, who’d brought the girls down on the train, she couldn’t get past eleven. So twelve would mean Simon was staying. She’d have to suss that out and quickly.

  Natasha, Branko and Mattie were sitting with their bare feet in the rain water that had gathered in one of the old copper tanks Tessa and Tom had dotted in various picturesque spots around the garden. The heat was going out of the day, but it was still very pleasant to paddle the water with their toes, jeans rolled up, sitting on cut-down oil drums, sipping their drinks and chatting.