I smiled. ‘Hey, I told you not to call me that.’
‘I like calling you Auntie. You’re the only one I’ve got.’
‘Not so,’ I pointed out. ‘There’s your Auntie Susie, in Monaco.’
He stopped smiling. ‘She doesn’t count. I don’t like her. Now that Uncle Oz is dead she’s off the list.’
‘That’s a bit harsh, Jonny.’
‘No it isn’t. Mum can’t stand her either, and Grandpa and Mary only tolerate her because of the two grandkids, Janet and my namesake. They’ve never forgiven her for the way she came between you and Uncle Oz. I was too young to know what was happening at the time, but now I do, and I feel the same as them.’
I was still pondering this as we walked into the catering tent, the only part of the tournament’s canvas village that appeared to be working. I chose a salad from the buffet table, but Jonny helped himself to an enormous plate of rigatoni, with a rich meatball sauce.
‘You know,’ I told him, ‘your grandpa’s never said a word against Susie to me.’
‘He wouldn’t, for Tom’s sake, but that’s how he feels, trust me. Mum and him always liked you, Auntie P. Mum says that Susie’s man, the one she was engaged to before, was hardly in the ground before she set her cap at Uncle Oz.’ He grinned, and I could see the kid that still lived within him. ‘She doesn’t actually say “Set her cap”, but you know what I mean.’
‘I know,’ I admitted, ‘but I put that behind me a long time ago. It’s history. Yes, Susie might have thrown herself at Oz, but he didn’t have to catch her, especially not since we were technically on honeymoon at the time. But the truth is I wasn’t perfect either. Your uncle managed to get the both of us pregnant at the same time, but I was so mad with him that I kept my condition to myself. . for four years, as it turned out. It wasn’t really Susie he left me for, you see, it was her baby. If I’d told him about mine. . about ours. .’
‘That’s what Mum says too. She says your problem then was being too nice about it.’
I chuckled. ‘That’s not something I’ve ever been accused of before. So anyway, how is your mother? I haven’t seen her for years, since the last time I saw you in fact.’
‘She’s still the same; fearsome as ever. She hasn’t changed a bit.’ He paused. ‘Well, she has in one respect. She’s Lady January, now that my stepfather’s a Court of Session judge, and a lord. She and Harvey live mostly in Edinburgh now, since my brother left to go to university.’
‘And how’s he? How’s Colin? He was a wild little bugger, as I remember.’
‘He’s tamed. He learned to wipe his nose when he was about fourteen and got all serious with it. He’s doing a maths degree at Oxford; I hardly ever see him.’
I thought of the Sinclair boys when first I’d met them, in the French village where their father had parked them and Ellie while he worked all the hours God sent. Urchins, both of them. What fifteen years could do. ‘Will that be two graduates in the family?’ I asked. ‘What do you golf students come out with? I don’t know.’
He smiled. ‘I’ve got a Bachelor’s degree in agribusiness; majoring in golf course management. If I don’t make it on tour I can fall back on that; maybe I’ll do an MBA, and go to work for Brush, or somebody like him.’
‘No worries there, son. You’ll make it all right. With a swing like that, how can you not?’
‘We’ve all got swings like that, Auntie. That’s why we use people like Lena Mankell. You saw her, did you?’ I nodded. ‘This is the first pro event I’ve ever played, and Brush has got me invitations to six more here in Europe, that’s as many as you can have, and another five in the States.’
‘Who’s this Brush you keep mentioning?’ I asked.
‘He’s my manager.’
‘Our Jonny; with a manager.’ I shook my head and smiled. ‘You do realise you’re making me feel ancient?’
‘Not you,’ he said, gallantly, and quickly enough for it to sound sincere. ‘We all have, even as amateurs, some of us. His real name’s James Donnelly, but everybody calls him “Brush”, because he sweeps everything up.’
‘Sounds handy. So how does the invitation thing work? Who invites you?’
‘The event sponsors; it gets you past pre-qualifying. Like I said, I can have up to seven this year, but if I manage to finish in the top ten in a tournament, I get automatic entry to the one the next week, and I don’t have to use up an invitation, if I have one. In theory, I could be playing full time for the rest of this season, and make enough money to get my playing card for next year. But on the other hand I could use up all my invites, miss every halfway cut, and not make a cent, then go to tour qualifying school and get cut again halfway through. If that happens, the sponsors that Brush has got for me will disappear,’ he snapped his fingers, ‘just like that.’
‘Do you believe,’ I asked, ‘that is what’s going to happen?’
‘No.’ His answer was instantaneous, and firm. ‘I believe I’m going to win this week and never look back. I really mean that. I did sports psychology in my degree; if you can’t manage your head, you’ll never manage your game.’
‘Is your mum coming to see you?’
He frowned. ‘She can’t. She had a hysterectomy a couple of weeks ago, and she’s not cleared to travel yet.’ He saw my expression. ‘Don’t worry, it’s nothing life-threatening. It was serious, though. She developed a condition called endometriosis, a couple of years back. It really floored her. They tried all sorts of treatments, lasers and things, but nothing did much good, and finally, surgery was recommended as the only way. She’ll be fine now, they say.’
I’d heard of that complaint, and thanked my lucky stars it hadn’t come my way. Anything that could floor Ellie Blackstone January was not to be messed with.
‘I’m glad to hear it’s sorted,’ I told him, and I was, very glad. I’d assumed that Ellie had set her face against me forever, and was hugely pleased to learn that she hadn’t. ‘So, since she’s not here, can I come and watch you?’
‘I hope you will. That’s one reason why I asked Uche to try to get in touch with you. I’m sorry if he confused you, by the way. Grandpa’s out of touch, so I couldn’t get your number from him. All Uche did was look up the local Yellow Pages and call the first number he found with an address in St Martí.’
That filled in all the blanks. ‘No worries. It’s a date, then. I’ll bring Tom at the weekend too.’
‘Good. I’m looking forward to meeting him. What’s he like?’
My son had met his Aunt Ellie on a few occasions, at first with Oz, and since then once or twice when we’d been visiting my dad in Auchterarder, and Grandpa Mac had picked him up and taken him to Fife for the day. He knew his cousin Colin as well, and Harvey, his newish uncle, but Jonny had been away on each visit, so their paths had never crossed.
I took a photograph, the one that goes with me everywhere, from my bag; Tom and Charlie, taken a few months before, on the beach in winter. ‘He’s the one without the tail,’ I said. My nephew’s eyes misted for a second or two as he looked at it. ‘Yes,’ I murmured. ‘He is like his father, isn’t he?’
Then I had another thought, a very big thought. ‘Where do you live, Jonny?’ I asked.
‘This week? Brush has rented a house for Uche and me, plus Lena and her crew. It’s not far from here, in a place called Caldes de something or other. We’re all staying there.’
‘No, not just this week; I meant permanently.’
He shrugged his shoulders and gave me that awkward Blackstone grin. ‘I don’t know,’ he confessed. ‘I’ve just left college, so I don’t have a place yet, other than Mum’s house.’
‘But you’ll need one, won’t you, for the weeks you’re not involved in a tournament?’
‘I suppose, yeah.’
‘Somewhere with decent weather and near good practice facilities? Somewhere central to the European events you’re playing?’
‘Yeah, but to be honest I haven’t thought much about it, not yet. I’ve been too full of this week.’
I took the plunge. ‘Then come and live with us; make our place your European base. It ticks all those boxes, the weather’s a hell of a lot better than St Andrews, plus it’s forty minutes from an airport. We’ve got room, Tom and me.’ Then a question that I’d overlooked popped into my head. ‘Or do you have other involvements? Do you have a girlfriend?’
He shook his head. ‘I’m between, you might say.’
‘Then what’s to stop you coming to stay with your old. . scratch that, middle-aged auntie?’
He blinked. ‘Nothing, I suppose. But things tend to get busy around me; the phone’s going all the time. Uche would need to be close by as well. My caddie goes where I go, during the day at any rate.’
‘We can find him somewhere. . when I think about it, I could squeeze him in as well.’
‘No thanks, I wouldn’t want him that close.’ He grinned. ‘Neither would you, for that matter. Uche’s a night owl; he’s a playboy. Lovely guy, but he needs to get his mind more focused if he wants to make it as a golfer.’
‘There are places available around St Martí that would give him his freedom, don’t you worry.’ I smiled at him, feeling a warmth akin to the way that Tom makes me glow. ‘Are you up for it?’ I asked again.
‘Well,’ he said slowly, ‘if you’re sure.’
Strangely, I hadn’t been surer of anything for quite some time. ‘Entirely. I’ll tell you what. Why don’t you come home with me tonight, and see how it feels?’
‘All right,’ he agreed. ‘But what about Tom? It’ll be a big change for him. Doesn’t he have a vote?’
‘Yes, but I know how he’ll cast it. You’ll be a hero to him; think of the bragging rights he’ll have at school.’
He grinned. ‘The dog in the photo? Is he yours?’
‘Yes, but don’t worry about Charlie; he does not have a vote.’
‘I’ll pay my way, mind,’ he warned.
I looked him in the eye. ‘And do you with your mother? The truth now; I’ll ask Mac if I have to.’
He shook his head.
‘Right you are, then. Jonny, we’re family. If you like, you can take us for a meal whenever you make a big enough cheque; that’ll be an added incentive for you. Every time you’re over a twelve-footer on the last green that’s worth a few grand, you can think of me done up to the nines in the best restaurant in L’Escala.’