The Piano Player's Son Read online

'In a second, baby,' Deanna called. 'Give me a second.'

  'Where's my black jacket, Mum?' Alicia persisted. 'You did pack it?'

  Deanna didn't answer. She ran her hands over his belly and her fingers hovered between his legs.

  'She can wait,' she whispered into his ear. Her lips were moist against his neck. He twisted round and pulled her closer. Her thighs were trapped between his. Her breast hung above his forehead, rounded and full. His palm tingled, longing to hold its smooth weight. He stretched upward, his mouth opening …

  'Mum! I can't find my black jacket!' Alicia's voice came again.

  Rick jumped up. Deanna was knocked off balance and stumbled against the table. She clutched his arm, steadying herself.

  'Just go, Deanna. Sort her out.' He heard the coldness in his voice and hated himself. For a second their eyes met.

  Rick had always loved his wife's blue eyes. They were the first thing he'd noticed about her. They seemed to change colour with her mood. They could be dark as midnight, or bright like a peacock's feather. But now he shrank from their stare. Deanna ran her finger down his arm. Even through the material of his shirt, he shivered at her touch.

  She turned away towards the door. 'I'll be right out, honey.' She looked back at him. 'I'll take that bath.'

  He sat down at the computer and pressed the mouse. The spreadsheet filled the screen again. He reworked the figures, but they still wouldn't add up. The take-over of a smaller company in Durham had strained him financially more than he'd expected, and it meant redundancies. He glanced at his watch. Time was getting on.

  He started drafting an email: As you all know, the recession has hit the IT industry as well as… He stopped. Most of the staff meant nothing to him, but Jim Foster had been with him for ten years. He thought back over them, remembering the hard work, long hours, the highs and lows—Jim beside him every step. What price loyalty?

  The door opened and Deanna peered round. 'How are you doing? The girls and I are ready for lunch.'

  He didn't look up. 'You'll have to give me another half an hour.'

  'Rick, you said twelve.' She came into the room and from the corner of his eye he glimpsed the black suit and the red and orange scarf wrapped in a turban round her head.

  'Don't pressurise me, Deanna. The service isn't until two.'

  'But we're going to your mom's first.'

  'I want to go straight to the church. Make sure everything's going to plan.'

  'I thought we were all leaving from the house together.'

  He fixed his eyes on the screen. 'You can't trust people to get things right.'

  'Eva might need you.'

  'I doubt it. Isabel and Grace are there and George will fuss over her as usual.'

  'Rick, darling, look at me.' Deanna moved to his side and cupped his face in both her hands. He was forced to meet her gaze. 'Don't you think, now with your father gone, it's time to ditch this thing with George?'

  He didn't answer.

  Deanna's hands dropped to her sides. 'We'll wait for you in reception,' she said.

  'Yes.' He knew she wanted him to say more, but he couldn't.

  'You won't be late?'

  The nerve in his left temple began to jump. He pressed his finger against it. 'Have you ever known me be late?'

  'No.'

  'I won't be late for my own father's funeral, then, will I?'

  *

  He waited until the sound of their voices disappeared down the corridor. Pouring a glass of water from the bottle on his desk, he searched in the front pocket of his brief case for his tablets. He thrust two tablets into his mouth and flung back his head. His throat closed and he started to gag. He caught the edge of the desk, knocking over the photo of Deanna and the girls. Cursing, he repositioned it in exactly the same spot. He forced the tablets down and turned back to the computer. As you all know, the recession has hit the IT industry… He carried on the email where he'd left off, but a few sentences in and his concentration wandered.

  It didn't matter how many times he explained to Deanna what growing up in his family had been like, she didn't understand. She was an only child brought up in Texas by wealthy parents who adored her. How could she appreciate the bewilderment, the anger he'd felt when he was seven and his mamma suddenly wasn't there any more? His grandmother had come to look after him and Isabel, and he'd hated her. Hated her thin spiteful nose, her big teeth that shifted when she spoke. She used to pinch him when he didn't say please and thank you, and she dragged the rough flannel across his face, not caring if he got soap in his eyes. Once he'd kicked her and she'd locked him in his bedroom without any tea.

  Rick had never been sure how long Mamma was away, but by the time she came back, he'd moved up a class at junior school, and he was in the football team. Not that anyone cared. 'You must play the piano,' his mother told him, 'like your father and grandfather.' For years he endured piano lessons, but while his feet worked to order on the football field, his fingers refused to follow the simplest instruction.

  Even worse than the piano was the new baby. It was bad enough competing with Isabel and Grace, but this was another boy. 'Here's George,' they said, 'a little brother for you to play with.' But what use to him was a baby in a lace shawl? And then, when he was still barely able to talk, baby George started to play the piano.

  After that it was always George this and George that: George, play the piano for us and Giorgio, carissimo, that's wonderful. It didn't matter how well Rick did in exams, how many teams he captained, he couldn't compete.

  Perhaps he should be grateful. If he hadn't been so jealous of his brother, he wouldn't have gone to America, and then he wouldn't have met Deanna. He'd got a job with IBM when he left university. The technology boom was beginning, and Rick turned all his frustration into a passion for computers. He was asked to go to Florida to work on IBM's new personal computer and it was in New York, at the party to launch the PC, that he met Deanna.

  She was a model and had been hired by the company to create the right ambience. Rick's only sexual experience had been a drunken fumble at the end of Finals, so he could hardly believe it when this beautiful girl showed an interest in him.

  'You're cute,' she pronounced, as she caught up two glasses of champagne from the tray that wafted by them. 'I'm Deanna. What do they call you?'

  'They call me Richard.'

  'Gee, that's so stuffy, but I just adore your accent.'

  He'd been careful not to drink too much, but now he knocked back the champagne in one go.

  'How about you take me to dinner when we get out of here?' She ran a red-tipped finger along his forearm. 'But only if I can call you Rick.'

  The wedding in Texas a year later was a lavish affair and Deanna's parents couldn't have treated him better if he'd been their son. They were heartbroken when he brought Deanna back to England, but he needed to show his own family how well he'd done. When they first came back, he'd worked for IBM in Manchester, then set up his own company in Newcastle. Although Deanna wasn't happy at first, she blossomed when babies arrived. As the girls got older and his business flourished, life was good, and last year they'd moved to a Victorian property, in the village of Rothbury. He was longing to show it off to his parents. That was what his last call home had been about.

  His father had answered the phone as he usually did. Eva said her English wasn't good enough and she got flustered if she couldn't understand.

  'Dad, what are you and Mum doing for Christmas?' he asked as soon as he heard his father's voice.

  'We thought we'd go to see George. You know he's set up this art school near Penzance.'

  'Deanna and I want you to come to us this year. No arguments.'

  'I'm not sure.' His father's voice was slow and measured, as always.

  'There's plenty of room in the new house,' Rick told him, 'and Deanna's made a wonderful job of the decorating. We got in Vaughan Carlton from New York. Did you read the article about him in the paper last week?'

  'Your mother
wants to see George. You know how she worries about him.'

  'He's a grown man!' Rick could see Deanna shaking her head at him from the other side of the room. 'You haven't been to see us for ages and the girls would love you to come.' It suddenly occurred to Rick that if her grandparents were staying, Alicia couldn't expect that mechanic to be invited for Christmas, something she'd been angling for.

  'Don't you think it would be too much for Deanna, what with her treatment?' Henry asked.

  'Deanna wants you to come. She hasn't got her own parents, has she? And she needs family at a time like this.'

  'There's Isabel to consider as well. Rose and Josh are going to Brian this year, so she'll be on her own.'

  'For Christ's sake, Dad! Are you sure Grace doesn't want you to fly over to Italy?'

  'Don't be like that, lad.'

  Rick gripped the receiver tighter, as if he could silence the voice on the other end. 'How come…' His heart bumped erratically in his chest. 'How is it that you consider every other fucking member of the family but not your eldest son?'

  The figures blurred in front of Rick on the computer screen, as he remembered Deanna dragging the phone from him. He covered his face with his hands and found they were wet.

  How pathetic! He was crying, for God's sake. He dragged his sleeve across his eyes. Saving the spreadsheet, he shut down the laptop. Deanna had laid out a fresh white shirt and his black tie on the bed. His dark suit was hanging on the wardrobe door. He stripped off his clothes and threw them on a chair. He yanked his suit trousers from the hanger and thrust his arms into the white shirt. He would go and find his girls. The sooner he told Deanna what he'd decided, the better.

  He was an intelligent capable man and it was ridiculous that he'd never learnt to play the piano. Ridiculous that he'd let George lord it over him because he could. Ridiculous that he'd spent so much time craving his father's attention, when all it would have taken was a few plinkety plonks on the piano.

  As Rick knotted his tie and pulled on his jacket, he felt more at peace than he had for a long time. The technology market would see another surge, Deanna's illness would soon be behind them, Alicia would stop all this talk about moving in with Gary and he, Rick, would learn to play the Moonlight fucking Sonata.

  Four

  Grace carried the tray of drinks carefully. It was hot and stuffy in the crowded room and she was light-headed from the glass of wine she'd drunk as soon as they arrived back from the crematorium. The noise in the sitting room grew: 'Yes, he was, thank you'… 'a lovely man'… 'thank you'… 'so sad'… 'a wonderful family'… 'a blessing really'… 'your poor mother'. She accepted the condolences, managed a few comments of her own, but was desperate for it to be over.

  The funeral had gone well considering her mother, barely visible beneath her black mantilla, had wept all through it. There was one awful moment when the silence the priest had called for 'to remember the man who meant different things to each of us' was punctured by a wail from Eva. She stumbled from her place in the front pew and flung her arms around the coffin, crying 'Forgive me, Henry, forgive me,' the words echoing round the church.

  At first no one moved, and then a laugh came from the back of the congregation. The sound broke the spell, and George and Uncle Eduardo rushed forward and led her back to the pew. In the car on the way to the crematorium, all she would say was 'I'm sorry. Henry would be so cross. He hated a fuss.' Rick had phoned ahead and the doctor was waiting at the house when they returned. He'd given her a sedative, and now she was asleep.

  Grace made another tour of the room, collecting empty glasses. As she reached the door, a man standing in the corner on his own touched her arm.

  'You must be Grace.' His voice was soft, but Grace detected a slight northern accent, similar to her father's. He was a short man with curly hair and sad-looking eyes, the colour of faded denim. 'I'm Archie Stansfield. I was a friend of Henry's.'

  'I'm glad to meet you.' Grace shook his hand. 'Thank you for coming. My father would have been pleased.' She had repeated the phrases so many times that it took her a moment to realise what the man was saying:

  'I don't think he would.'

  'Sorry, I must have misunderstood… I thought you said you were a friend.' Grace was tired. The day had been a strain. Franco should be with her.

  'I was a friend of Henry's,' the man said again. 'We went to school together, but…' He shrugged.

  'Archie Stansfield?' Grace said.

  He nodded. 'That's me.'

  'I'm sure I'd remember if my father had mentioned you.'

  'We fell out. We hadn't spoken for years.'

  Grace stared at the man, not knowing what to say. 'My father was the kindest of men,' she managed at last. 'I can't imagine him falling out with an old friend.'

  'We had a fight.'

  'A fight?' Grace's arms ached from the tray of glasses. 'An argument, you mean?'

  'No, we punched and kicked each other.' The old man's eyes no longer looked soft and faded. The blue blazed like the fiercest of skies. 'My sister had just died, and I was angry.'

  Angry? The hubbub of voices in the room fell away, and all Grace could hear was that word angry… Everyone seemed angry. She was angry herself, Franco was, Isabel, Rick, while her mother had always erupted in angry outbursts. It was her father who'd been the peacemaker, and now here was this man making accusations…

  'I blamed him, you see.'

  'What are you talking about?'

  'My sister died and it was his fault.'

  'I don't know who on earth you are.' Grace stopped. Words were trapped in her mouth. Heat rose up through her chest. She filled her lungs with air. 'But today is my father's funeral, and you come here, souring his memory…' She put her hand to her head. It felt all swimmy, as if she might faint.

  The man took the tray from her grasp and set it down on the coffee table. He straightened up. 'I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said anything'

  She glared at the man. Who was he? None of it made any sense. 'You said you were at school with my father?'

  'That's right. But after the fight… well… I saw him in the distance, a few times. That would have been when his parents were alive and he came up to visit them. But we didn't speak.' The man gave a small smile. 'I did see you once when you were a baby. He brought you with him when he came to the house. He wanted to try and be friends again. But I couldn't. I was still too angry.'

  Grace noticed that people were starting to leave. Over near the window, Isabel was talking to Uncle Eduardo. She caught Grace's glance and Grace saw the frantic signals in her eyes: Help! Rescue me! Never mind Eduardo—he was nothing compared with this horrible Stansfield toad.

  'I used to get letters from him every so often. Needed forgiveness, I reckon. But after your George was born…'

  Oh no, he was still going on. She had to get rid of him. 'You said you hadn't spoken to my father for years.'

  'That's right. Nigh on forty, I'd say.'

  'Then how did you know? Who told you? About the funeral, I mean.'

  'Eva.'

  'My mother?'

  'She phoned me the day after he died.'

  'My mother doesn't even know you.'

  The old man shook his head. 'Your dad must have told her about me.'

  'Please go. I don't want to hear any more. Not today, of all days.'

  She saw Archie Stansfield reach into his pocket. What now? Some new piece of evidence incriminating her father?

  He held out a white business card. 'I'm truly sorry to upset you. But I'm staying in London for a few days. I've got a room at The Queen's Hotel in Highbury.' He pushed the card towards her.

  'That's the telephone number,' he said. 'I'd like to see you again. Explain.'

  It was early evening when the last mourners left the house. Rick and his family went back to their hotel, and Isabel and Rose left soon after Brian appeared to collect Josh.

  Grace went upstairs to check on Eva. Uncle Eduardo had wanted to sit with her, but Grace had e
ventually persuaded him it would be better to let her sleep. Grace tiptoed into the room and gazed down at her mother in the gentle light of the bedside lamp. She looked peaceful, but what secrets did that head hold? What did she know about Archie Stansfield? Her hair, which she had worn in a bun for the funeral, had worked loose and now lay in untidy straggles across the pillow. It was the first time Grace had known her go to bed without her hair neatly drawn into its thick plait.

  Downstairs in the dining room, George was sitting at the table with a bottle of wine and two glasses.

  'Thank goodness,' he said as Grace pushed open the door. 'I thought I might have to drink myself into oblivion on my own.'

  Grace sat at the table opposite him and for a moment their eyes met. They both had the same chocolate-coloured eyes, olive skin, full lips. Their mother's face.

  George raised his glass to the portrait of Henry that hung over the fireplace. Since he left school, George had only worked when his father refused to subsidise him, preferring to paint and travel. But last year, he'd set up an art school in Cornwall. None of the family thought it could work. George had never managed to sustain a relationship or a job for long, so how would he find the dedication needed to run a business? Henry had gone down to check on him.

  He didn't say much when he came back except, 'It's a good set up he's got there. We've got to give the lad a chance.' And he'd produced the portrait George had done of him, insisting it hung in pride of place. It was a painting full of gaudy colour and awkward lines. When they sat at the table to eat, everyone said it made them feel uncomfortable, but as Grace stared up at the portrait now, it was her father's eyes which sought hers.

  George followed her gaze. 'What do you think?'

  'I like it.'

  'You're not just saying that? You know what a sweetie you are.'

  'Honestly. I was thinking that minute how like Dad it is.'

  George poured them both another glass of wine. 'I'm going to miss the old man so much, you know. He's the only one who always believed in me.'

  'How can you say that? Mum's besotted with you. Always has been.'