‘What should I do, Sophie? If I say no he’ll spike my promotion, but if I say yes I’ll be so overwhelmed by work I won’t be able to function.’
Briony was sitting in the office of one of her colleagues, surrounded by posters of illuminated manuscripts with marginalia of fabulous beasts. Sophie was a mediaevalist, Swedish, in her early thirties, with short, clipped fair hair streaked with purple. Her seated pose, upright, long legs in skinny jeans crossed at the knee, suited her forthright, don’t-mess-with-me manner. She was the department’s union rep, so a natural person to go to, but Briony, who hated being confrontational, had really gone to her for friendly, not formal, advice.
‘He has no right, Briony.’ Sophie jabbed the air with a blue-nailed finger. ‘You don’t have to take the work on and there would be trouble if he tried to interfere with the promotion board proceedings. Still, he is on it and his word counts. You do want him on your side.’
‘So I should say yes?’
‘You should say no. Be tough and he’ll respect you. That’s the type of man he is. So much of this place runs on people’s goodwill, that’s the trouble. And he exploits that. But there are rules, and if necessary the union will back you up.’
‘I don’t want to involve the union at the moment. I worry about appearing a troublemaker.’
‘That is a typical female response,’ Sophie said with a sigh. ‘I like making trouble.’ Her eyes sparkled and Briony laughed. It was good to feel that someone was on her side. All too often in this place staff crept about doing what they were told. Once she’d jokingly said to Sophie that she was surprised that the Head of Department had agreed to the appointment of someone like her with such trenchant views. Sophie’s response was direct: ‘I was the best candidate for the post. You have to believe in yourself, Briony, and others will believe in you too.’
‘You’re lucky having such self-confidence,’ she sighed now.
She stood to go and Sophie bounced up and gave her a hug. ‘So, think about it over the weekend, eh? Then blaze in on Monday and tell him your decision. Remember, it’s your life.’
‘You’re right.’ Briony’s eye fell on one of the posters. ‘That griffin – it is a griffin, isn’t it? – looks like someone we both know.’ Sophie stared at it and they both burst out laughing. It was the mustard-coloured legs of the creature and the curly bits of feather on its head.
As she walked back to her own office she saw that she had a missed call. Greg Richards. She sat for a while at her desk wondering what he might want, then shrugged, her curiosity getting the better of her reluctance. She touched the screen of the phone to ring him back.
The little mews tucked away in the maze of streets north of Sloane Square was deserted when Briony walked down it early the following evening, the only noise being the flapping of a giant piece of polythene broken loose from the scaffolding that enveloped one of the houses. The builder’s board shining in the streetlight read Judd Holdings Basement Solutions. Not fun to live next door to, she told herself, examining the numbers on the doors she passed. Number Five, however, was several yards beyond the building work, with a neat two-storey Georgian frontage and a pair of olive trees in tubs standing sentinel at the entrance. Briony pressed the brass doorbell and smoothed her hair while she waited.
The door flew open and there was Greg in T-shirt, jeans and loafers. ‘Briony, come in out of the cold, honey,’ and she found herself sucked into a warm, dimly lit hallway redolent with the savoury smell of cooking. She could hear the tinkle of piano music. He kissed her on both cheeks and she gave up her coat and handed over the wine she’d brought.
‘I don’t know if it’s any good – the man in the shop picked it.’
He squinted at the label, said he was sure it would be lovely and ushered her into a large, knocked-through living room with two black, grey and sable velvet sofas festooned with furry zebra-striped cushions. The far wall was lined with chunky bookshelves in a light-coloured wood. Ceiling lights like abstract sculptures in glass and metal twinkled above her head.
‘It’s like the Tardis,’ she exclaimed. The modernity of the inside was such a contrast to the exterior of the house. ‘Gorgeous, of course, but I’d never have guessed all this lay beyond your Regency front door.’ When she slipped off her shoes, the hardwood floor was deliciously warm beneath her feet.
‘It’s a listed building, of course,’ he said. ‘But my predecessor did most of the work inside. God knows how she got it past the planning department. Now what can I get you to drink?’
While he was out in the kitchen fetching white wine, Briony surveyed the contents of the shelves, several of which were set wide-spaced for the outsize art books and his vinyl collection. Rows of hardbacks mostly had titles like Nietzsche and Leadership and The Zen of Globalism, but there was an impressive line of recent celebrity sporting biographies, too. She was concluding sadly that there was nothing here that she would want to read when Greg returned with a bottle in an ice bucket and a couple of glass goblets. She sat down rather self-consciously on one of the velvety sofas. It was squashy, but very comfortable.
‘It’s good of you to come,’ he said as they clinked glasses and he settled on a sofa opposite, one arm along the back of it. Although his pose was a study in relaxation, she sensed a coiled-up energy and tension in the firm line of his lips. ‘I’ll be straight with you, Briony. As I told you on the phone, your friend Luke mentioned in an email that you’d found another set of letters, from this guy Paul, and . . . well, I’d better explain my interest. Did you bring them with you, by the way?’
‘Yes, they’re in my bag.’ Briony felt a bit annoyed with Luke for telling Greg about them, but recognized he’d done so in all innocence, thinking they might offer further information about the garden.
Greg was eyeing the bag which she’d left by the door of the room.
He leaned forward and, setting his goblet on the table, stared across at her. ‘I would like to know what’s in them. It’s my father I’m thinking about. He’s elderly, you see, and he worries about these things.’
‘What would he be worried about?’
‘That there’s something detrimental in them about his father – my grandfather that is – Ivor. I’m not sure what it is exactly, he won’t say. It all started when I told him about you that time you came to stay at Westbury Lodge. It seemed to upset him.’
‘I didn’t mean to upset anyone.’ Briony’s nerves were on edge. She thought of the farmer, David Andrews, and his wife Alison, how her visit had disturbed them, too.
‘I’m not saying that you did. Tell me about the letters, though, Briony. Do they mention my grandfather?’
‘They do, yes. I’m not sure how much background you know?’
‘Only that Paul was a German who worked on the estate as a gardener and there was some animosity between the two of them.’
‘Yes, that’s more or less it. They both fancied the same woman – that was Sarah – but it was more than that. Your grandfather disliked him because he thought he couldn’t trust him, saw him as the enemy. Then they ended up in the army together in Egypt.’
‘Perhaps I should flick through them, then, just to reassure my dad.’ Greg’s voice was very mild and reasonable and Briony didn’t know why a feeling of reluctance came over her. She had to force herself to stand up and fetch her bag. She brought out the cigar box, thinking how light and inconsequential it was. When she opened it, she saw that in her rush last night she’d not put everything back tidily. ‘Apologies,’ she said, ‘it’s a bit of a jumble.’
‘No worries. I’ll sort them out.’ They were standing very close together now, so close she could smell his expensive cologne. She glanced up into the friendly, wide-spaced eyes, then down at the box in her hand.
‘Let’s have a look,’ he said and he came and sat down close beside her on her sofa and took the first letter from the pile. She watched him open it and frown at the difficult handwriting. Greg listened carefully as she read it out to him, tapping the table with the side of his finger. ‘I see,’ he said, somewhat mysteriously. ‘And what about this one?’
The next he picked out was so plainly a love letter that Briony felt self-conscious reading it aloud to this man who sat so close. She did so quickly and folded it away. ‘There are several in that vein,’ she told him.
‘He has a way with words, this Paul,’ Greg said in a caressing voice that made her feel uncomfortable and she felt herself shrink away from him on the sofa, wishing now that she hadn’t come.
Greg smiled, his eyes glinting. ‘Nothing about my grandfather so far.’
‘There’s mention of him later in some of the ones sent from Egypt, but I still have one or two to read. I had to stop last night because I had work to do.’ Why did she feel so on edge?
‘What do they say?’ His voice had a harsher tone this time. Suddenly she wanted very much to go home. She closed the box and started to stand up. ‘Briony, please. I tell you what, perhaps I can keep them, ask my PA to photocopy them in the morning and courier them back to you?’
‘No, I don’t feel I can do that,’ she whispered.
He stood up too. ‘Why not? You can trust me with them, can’t you?’ He looked so pleading and she couldn’t say what it was that troubled her.
‘I’ll finish reading them and type them up. That’s what I did with Sarah’s letters.’
‘Ah yes, Luke sent me the transcript.’
‘He did?’ That was annoying of Luke, but then he wasn’t to know.
‘Yes. In respect of the garden, of course. The letters were extremely interesting. There’s not much about old Ivor, but there is a bit where Sarah tells Paul she thinks my grandfather really has a bit of a thing for her. So you’re right.’
‘She talks about it several times.’
‘It’s what my dad thought, too.’
‘Perhaps I ought to meet your father sometime and swap information.’
‘I don’t think in his current frame of mind that he’d want that.’ Again, that whisper of danger.
Briony took up the cigar box and fitted the elastic band round it. ‘In that case, we’ll have to talk once I’ve made the transcript. I’m sure I’ll be able to reassure him. It’s no crime, after all, for two men to have disliked or distrusted one another.’
‘No, you’re quite right. I can’t think why he’s so worked up about the matter.’
She drew her bag towards her and fitted the box inside, then stood and turned to face him. ‘Please don’t worry, Greg. I’m not trying to make anyone unhappy, just to find out some things about my own family.’
‘What if you dig up something you’d rather lay forgotten, Briony? Have you thought of that?’ Although he smiled, she sensed seriousness behind his words.
‘What do you mean?’
Greg only shook his head. ‘Shall I call you a taxi?’
‘I’ll be fine on the tube,’ she insisted.
He led the way into the hall where he paused. ‘I haven’t shown you the rest of the house, have I? Leave your bag there and I’ll give you a quick tour.’
It seemed churlish not to agree and she followed him through first into a beautifully lit modern kitchen where his supper was cooling, then up softly carpeted stairs, and in and out of several opulently furnished rooms. The house was lovely but somehow it left her cold. It was a place he stayed, like a hotel. Everything was new and clean and sparkling, but when she glimpsed inside the open door of a walk-in wardrobe there were only two shirts hanging in it. She used the bathroom and was delighted by the soft fluffy towels, perfectly folded, but it seemed profane to dry her hands on one.
When she finally picked up her bag to go, he drew her to him and kissed her mouth. Her skin prickled and warmth shot through her and it was with some effort that she pushed him gently away. She brushed off his offer to walk her to the tube station and set off through the chilly night alone, pulling her scarf snugly round her neck.
As she walked through the crisp evening, fallen leaves rustling under her feet, she felt glad to put distance between herself and Greg. She couldn’t work him out. There was a fascinating, charismatic aspect to him, and yet at the same time she couldn’t read him. Did he treat all women as he did her, or was there genuinely some spark unique to the two of them? She fancied she could smell his cologne still and walked even faster, trying to throw off her confusion, training her mind instead to go over the events of the evening. His interest in the letters troubled her. She remembered that Luke had shown him her transcript of Sarah’s letters to Paul. A lump came into her throat for it felt like a betrayal, though it was her fault for not apprising Luke of her doubts about Greg.
At least she’d hadn’t left Greg the letters this evening, she thought, as she entered the tube station and passed through the ticket barriers. Warm air from the tunnels sucked her down the steps to the bright platform. Safe in a seat on the busy train, her hands closed round the box in her bag. Yes, she still had the letters.
It was after nine when she closed her front door behind her. In the kitchen she unpacked the milk, bread and a plastic box of sushi she’d stopped to buy, then crouched to delve in her bag for an article she’d printed off, intending to read at the table as she ate. It proved elusive, but when she pulled out the cigar box to facilitate her search, she knew immediately by its lightness that something was wrong. She rolled off the elastic band and opened the lid. The box was empty.
The shock sent her sliding to the floor, where she sat with her mouth open trying to assemble her thoughts. Greg. The bastard. All that schmoozing and showing her round his pied-à-terre and he must have seized an opportunity – while she was in the bathroom, probably – to take the letters. She couldn’t believe that he’d stoop that low. Though she sensed it would do no good, she hastily emptied the bag, but the letters weren’t there.
Her hands were trembling as she fished her phone out of her pocket, so she had to try twice before she found his number, but ended up speaking to his voicemail. ‘I never believed you’d do a thing as contemptuous as that. I was right not to trust you. I expect those letters back first thing in the morning or I’ll contact the police.’
She hardly noticed the food she ate, she felt so angry and distressed. She held the phone, but the screen stared back at her blank, silent. With a huge effort of will she texted Luke, telling him what had happened and warning him not to give Greg any more information about Sarah and Paul.
Then she made herself mint tea and sat nursing it and thinking, its fresh smell a comfort, going over and over what had happened. What mattered to Greg so much that he had to have those letters? His grandfather did not come across well in them, arrogant, bigoted maybe to modern eyes, but Sarah, in her letters, also portrayed him with fondness. She hadn’t read all of Paul’s yet – a pile of marking had interrupted – and at the thought a shaft of misery pierced her. He, Greg, would read them first. It felt like a violation. Spurred by anger, she picked up the phone to ring him again, but there was still no answer. She began to pace the flat, like a caged animal, her agitation growing, but short of jumping in the car and racing back to Greg’s she didn’t know what to do. She had visions of herself banging on his door and shouting and rousing the neighbours and felt hot and cold with embarrassment at the thought.
Briony slumped down at her desk, intending to look through her emails, keeping her phone by her in case. She’d sat here last night, she remembered, reading those damned essays. The cigar box had been here, too, she’d been reading Paul’s letters there previously. There were the books she’d dumped from her bag before she’d set off for work. Then she’d snatched up the box, slid the elastic band over it and slipped it in to show Greg. Her eye fell on something, a tiny corner of buff paper peeping out from under the pile of books. It piqued her interest. She nudged the books aside, and the paper revealed itself as an envelope with a loop of familiar black writing on it. She saw to her joy a small haphazard pile of old letters. Paul’s letters. She must have left them there, the ones she hadn’t read. Eagerly she grabbed them up, half a dozen of them. ‘Thank you!’ she whispered to whomever might be listening, Paul’s ghost perhaps, or Sarah’s, smiling in the darkness. The thought enchanted her as she switched on the desk light and opened the first letter. She was quickly absorbed, her eyes widening as she read.