The Lost Bookshop(49)

Over dinner, I listened as they chatted animatedly about plans for the future and I realised that, during my short absence, things had changed at home. And for the better. My mother had become something of an eco-warrior slash militant cyclist and Lucinda seemed, well, happy.

‘So, what was Ireland like?’ Neil asked, his dark eyes peeping through a heavily back-combed mop of hair. ‘Lu said you were researching an old bookshop. Sounds cool.’

I finished my last slug of wine before answering.

‘It’s proving elusive. But I may have found something else of interest,’ I said, the smile forming on my lips.

‘What?’ my mother said, cutting the Viennetta into slices at the worktop. She loved a classic dessert.

‘I’ve met someone. In Ireland. I’m going back as soon as I can get a flight.’

All of their faces turned towards me. I couldn’t quite believe I’d said it. But that’s how certain I was.

‘Are you seriously leaving the country so you won’t have to change a nappy?’ my sister asked, slack-jawed.

‘Bit extreme, mate,’ Neil chimed in.

Mother cut another chunk of Viennetta. She decided this was a subject she alone should tackle.

‘Henry, sweetheart, I know you were something of a late developer, but I don’t want you turning into some kind of Lothario.’

I couldn’t help but laugh. If only she knew.

‘So you just came back to see Isabelle. What about Dad?’

Lucinda had always been his champion. She’d somehow managed to miss the worst of his drinking and he’d never taken his moods out on her.

‘What about him?’

‘Aren’t you going to visit him? He’s been asking about you.’

‘You’ve seen him?’

‘Of course,’ she said, then flashed a look at my mother.

‘You too?’ I asked.

She shook her head.

‘No. I’m moving on with my life. I have to put my own needs first now. You are both grown-ups and can make your own decisions. He’ll always be your father, Henry, but it’s up to you.’

If it had been up to me, he would have been a better father. It was never up to me. It was up to him.





Chapter Twenty-Five





OPALINE





England, 1922


I awoke the next morning to the sound of a milk truck making deliveries. The daylight had barely begun to breach the dusky pink curtains, but I could make out the line of his shoulder and his dark mop of hair on the pillow. Armand slept so soundly, it made me question my constant self-doubt. I doubted myself, my choices, my desires and my abilities all of the time. Oh, to be a man who is always sure of himself! And sure of his place in the world.

In becoming Miss Gray, I wasn’t just hiding from Lyndon, I was hiding from everything and everyone. All of the expectations of my gender to be all of the things I no longer was – pure, timid, passive. I wished we were still in Paris, where being ordinary was frowned upon and breaking the rules was a rite of passage.

I hadn’t slept well, or at all really. I found my thoughts returning to Matthew. He had visited the shop briefly before I left. I think he was embarrassed by what had happened, how we had held each other that night. I imagine he would not have come at all if he did not need to collect the rent, but his good manners precluded him from having a purely transactional visit and so he began to speak about the shop and his childhood dreams to become a magician.

‘A magician?’ I echoed in disbelief. As if to prove his point, he reached behind my ear and found a small glass ball. I reached out to take it from his palm, yet somehow it had disappeared into thin air.

‘How did you do that?’ I said, smiling brightly.

‘Ah, now that would be telling.’

If only I could have made my feelings disappear so easily. On the days he came, everything was brighter, sunnier, happier. But when he left to return to his family, I felt wretched.

‘Mon Opale,’ Armand whispered, nuzzling into my neck.

I let him put his arms around me, chasing the loneliness away. I hadn’t intended to come back to his rooms, but I suppose from the minute we set eyes on each other in Yorkshire, it was inevitable. Yet I couldn’t help thinking that I held no place in his heart above any of the other women he bedded. Well, I wasn’t going to let him think that I cared for him either. That way, I wouldn’t get hurt. The reasoning of an idiot; but love, as they say, is blind.

‘I must go,’ I said eventually, kissing him lightly on his cheek.

‘Mais non, reste.’

‘I cannot. My boat leaves this evening and I have some business to attend to before then.’

‘Business?’ He propped himself up on his elbow and watched me dress. God, he was gorgeous! An Adonis. I had to turn my back on him while buttoning up my blouse.

‘A book.’

‘Of course it’s a book. Tell me.’

I turned to look at him. Yes, he was beautiful and yes, he was a valuable connection in the book dealing world. He had also helped me to escape Paris. Yet, as I had realised in Sotheby’s, he was cut from the same cloth as Rosenbach. Ruthless, single-minded and greedy. When it came to books, perhaps I was too, because in that moment I realised that while there may be honour amongst thieves, the same could not be said for book dealers.