Susan shook Paul’s hand, then Jon’s, holding on to it – or so it seemed to me – a bit longer than necessary upon meeting someone for the first time. She glanced from Jon to Alison and said, ‘Excuse me for asking, but this isn’t your first marriage, is it?’
Jon fumbled the bottle he was carrying, nearly dropping it, but he recovered quickly. ‘Ah, no.’
Alison tripped across the carpet to join her husband, slipped an arm through his, squeezing tight, standing in we’ll-get-through-this-together solidarity. ‘Jon’s first wife died more than a decade ago in a sailing accident.’
Susan cocked her head. ‘I’m seeing a B. Bonnie? Barbara? Bess?’
‘Beth!’ Alison bounced up and down on her toes. ‘Jon’s first wife was named Beth!’
‘Beth.’ Susan stood quietly for a few seconds. ‘Beth. That’s right. I’m feeling… Oh, my gosh!’ Susan’s hand shot to the back of her head. ‘I’m feeling pain here.’ She massaged the spot vigorously, then pressed her hand against her temple. ‘And here.’ To Jon she said, ‘Is that significant?’
‘I… I don’t know,’ he stammered, the scalp under his pale hair turning pink. ‘Biding Thyme washed up on the rocks near Stumpy Steps with her sails still set. Beth’s body was never found. The River Dart can be unforgiving.’
Behind me, Janet clucked her tongue and muttered, ‘Every year, the Dart takes a heart. That’s what they say.’
A tremor shook Susan’s body. She shrugged it off, then turned to face the rest of us, hands raised in apology. ‘Poof! Sorry. Gone. Do forgive me. It’s sometimes hard to turn the voices off. That’s why I plug myself into my iPod whenever I drive or walk the dog.’
‘Ever try a tinfoil hat?’ Paul wondered aloud.
I found my husband’s foot and mashed down on it, hard. ‘You promised to behave,’ I hissed.
Susan dissolved into peals of laughter. ‘Hannah, your husband is a hoot!’
I shot said husband the evil eye. ‘Oh, he’s a laugh a minute, all right!’
‘Well,’ Janet announced from the doorway. ‘Now that we’ve got that all settled, I wonder if you’d like to move into the dining room. Dinner, as they say, is served.’
As I followed our hostess into the dining room, my stomach clenched. Alison Hamilton and I were supposed to be friends. But this was the first I’d heard of a previous Mrs Hamilton.
At my house, you’re lucky to get a salad accompanying your casserole or one-skillet meal, but things were different at Horn Hill House. I’d just polished off my starter of smoked salmon and quail eggs and was buttering a fresh-baked roll, when the conversation took a hard right turn. Away from the Devon weather – if you don’t like it, wait a few minutes – to something even more interesting than wondering about Jon’s marital history.
‘How long have you known each other?’ Paul asked Janet, his eyes ping-ponging between our hostess on his left and Susan Parker across the table.
Susan laid down her fish knife. ‘Janet, haven’t you told them how we met?’
Janet blushed. ‘I didn’t want to scare them off.’
Paul looked puzzled. ‘Why would we be scared off?’
‘It’s a long story.’ Janet stood, pushed her chair back. As she circled the table collecting our empty plates she said, ‘Why don’t you tell them, Alan, while I go and fetch the main course.’
Like spectators at a tennis match, all heads swiveled obediently in Alan’s direction. He squirmed in his chair.
Paul tipped his wine glass at our host. ‘Yes, Alan. Do tell.’
Alan took a fortifying sip of a fine Sancerre. ‘It goes back to when the twins were born,’ he began.
I remembered that the twins, Samantha and Victoria, were around six years old and did the math. ‘So, 2004?’
‘Yes, that’s right. The girls were delivered at Torbay Hospital in Torquay and everything was fine until we brought them home.’
‘The girls were ill?’
‘No, no, the babies were fine,’ Janet interjected from the kitchen. A second later she appeared carrying three fully loaded dinner plates, one in each hand, and a third balanced on her left forearm. ‘Once we got the girls home, though, the strangest things began happening.’ As Alan helped pass the dinner plates around, Janet continued. ‘It was little things at first. After their two a. m. nursing, I’d put the girls down in their cots and go back to bed.’
‘They had separate cots,’ Alan added. ‘That’ll be important later.’
‘I’d just get back to sleep when Victoria would start to fuss. I’d ignore it, and then Samantha would chime in. So I’d go up, burp them, check their nappies, get them settled. Up and down, up and down, sometimes it seemed I was awake all night. Excuse me for a minute while I get the rest of your dinners.’
It sounded like new-motherhood-business-as-usual to me, but I figured Alan would get around to the ‘strange’ part eventually.
‘Janet was breastfeeding, so by the end of the second week, she was exhausted,’ Alan went on. ‘So one night when they started fussing I told her, “They’re fed, they’re dry, ignore them. The girls will go to sleep eventually.” But she was a new mother, and worried over every little thing.’
‘As one should do,’ Alison chimed in.
‘Exactly as one should do,’ echoed Janet, reappearing with the four remaining plates. She set one down in front of me and I nearly swooned: lamb with leeks and ginger. The aroma was intoxicating.
Janet reclaimed her seat at the head of the table, picked up her knife and fork and indicated that we should all do the same. ‘One night, though, I was so tired that when Victoria started tuning up, I decided to stay in bed and see how long she’d cry. Five minutes? Ten? An hour? After three minutes Samantha had joined the chorus and I was crazy to get out of bed, but Alan held me back. “Do you hear that?” he asked me, and he started squeezing my arm. “What?” I snapped. “All I hear is babies screaming.”’
‘What I heard was singing,’ Alan explained.
Janet paused, a fork full of lamb halfway to her mouth. ‘I didn’t hear anything, but after a minute or two Victoria stopped crying and seconds later, Samantha did, too.’
‘Somebody was singing a lullaby, very softly,’ Alan whispered. ‘“Sweet and low, sweet and low, wind of the western sea,”’ he crooned in a gravelly baritone.
‘Thank you, Luciano!’ Janet raised a hand, cutting her husband off before he could reach the second stanza. ‘I never heard the lullaby myself, regrettably, but soon enough, other weird things began to happen. Victoria’s cuddly lamb would end up in Samantha’s cot, and Sam’s cuddly bear would be in Vicky’s. I thought I was losing my mind. One day when I put the girls down for their nap, it was a little warm in the nursery, so I didn’t swaddle them in blankets like I usually did. When I came back to check up on them, though, both the girls were tucked in. Alan was always so good with the girls that I accused him of doing it.’
Alan raised an honest-injun hand. ‘Not I.’
‘He didn’t believe me at first.’
‘Quite true. I’d read about post-partum depression and, just between us, I thought the old girl was losing her grip.’
Jon swiped at the strand of corn silk that insisted on flopping over his left eye no matter how many haircare products he used. ‘Post-partum depression has been known to cause hallucinations and delusions.’