At Emperor Court, Claire and Serena had settled into their second bottle of Pinot Grigio. Also, for good measure, an extra steamer tray of snowy dumplings with fish and cauliflower.
‘It feels so strange,’ Serena was saying, ‘being here with you. My poor Leo dead in a car crash. I shouldn’t be here…’
‘Don’t be silly. This is exactly where you should be. You need to talk.’
‘I feel almost guilty, enjoying it, even just a little. This lovely restaurant…’
‘Is taking your mind off things. Just for a short while. Leo would understand,’ said Claire.
‘He would,’ Serena agreed, gazing into her wine glass.
‘He would,’ Adam seconded, from his adjoining table.
‘Doesn’t Walter ever take you out?’ Claire asked after a moment.
‘Chance would be a fine thing. Walter’s a great chap, and very generous in many ways, but’ – Serena shrugged – ‘he’s never had much luck with money.’
Claire sipped her wine. ‘Doesn’t that ever worry you?’
‘Why should it? I’m not exactly broke.’
‘Perhaps I shouldn’t say this, but d’you ever think he might be–’
‘Sponging off me?’ Serena cut in, sharply.
‘Please, Serena, don’t take this the wrong way.’
‘Sorry.’ Serena took a deep breath. ‘It was an accusation Leo made. He never got on with Walter. It’s the whole stepfather thing. You know, those kids would much prefer it if I’d just stayed alone. Regardless of whatever happiness or companionship I might want or need. Matty doesn’t get on with him that well either. It’s a strain, frankly. With her in the same house. Particularly recently.’
‘With the deaths?’
‘Of course. And then, I shouldn’t tell you this, but…’ Now she was laughing.
‘What?’
‘Walter wants to marry me.’
‘Does he?’
Adam leant forward. Good God! Here was a development.
‘He keeps proposing.’ Serena was grinning. ‘In the most unlikely places.’
‘And you haven’t accepted?’
‘I’m flattered, obviously, but I’m not sure I want to get married again. When the chips are down, it doesn’t offer any more security than not being married.’
‘I suppose it would if Walter had money.’
‘Well, he doesn’t. So it’s very romantic and all that, but what, really, is the point?’
‘Plus he’d presumably be tied in to a share of your house; and, I suppose, whatever you get from Adam?’
A classic, typical, barely-disguised, nosy leading question from Claire; not that Serena seemed to mind.
‘This was the discussion I was having with Leo,’ she replied. ‘When he called him a sponger.’
‘Not to his face?’
Serena laughed. ‘No. Just to me. But apropos of the proposal, which Leo was completely, almost hysterically, against. You know, you’d think you can share stuff with your nearest and dearest but…’ She tailed off, as if not wanting to criticise her now dead son.
‘When was that?’ Claire asked.
‘A couple of weeks ago.’
‘And you told Walter?’
‘I did, eventually. I was upset. Leo’s a sweet boy, but it’s really none of his business what I do with my life.’
‘Although it is – was – his business what you do with your money. If you married Walter that might have robbed Leo of whatever you would have left him. In due course.’
‘Not if I specified in my will what I was leaving him. As I have done. Anyway, how much did he want? Adam left both him and Matty a pretty hefty chunk.’
‘And you too?’
Serena smiled seraphically. ‘You know, my relationship with Adam has been such an odd one. He treated me so badly when he ran off with Julie, leaving me with the kids, at the worst possible age. But then, he’s always wanted to stay friends. He told me once he wished he’d never left me.’
‘Did he? When was that?’
‘A couple of years ago. Just before I met Walter. I must have regained my mojo big time because first of all Adam was all over me like a rash again and then suddenly there was Walter. And now, yes, there’s some money too. Which he wasn’t obliged to leave me at all given everything I already had in the settlement. I’ve even got La Residenza. Our villa in Puglia. I suppose we did build it together.’
Adam, riveted though he was by this exchange, was feeling a strange, strong, unearthly pull.
Now he heard a distant voice, growing louder. ‘Adam, Adam Albury, your daughter Matilda ne-e-e-eds you…’
Matilda! What was wrong with her? No, not his beloved Matilda. He wasn’t having anything happen to her. Let me go to her now, he willed, hands together.
And just like that he was gone, spiralling down the joint line of desire towards Balham.