‘You’re up early?’ I said. ‘Not like you.’
He finally looked at me. ‘I have a lot on my mind.’
My heart sank. He was pissed off with me from the previous evening – couldn’t say I blamed him, but I still stood by what I believed. However many times the others told me Joy had mislaid those earrings, I wasn’t convinced. I wanted to talk to Dan, to talk about what had happened the night before. He was obviously still smarting and we had to clear the air. So I suggested the kids play hide-and-seek in the garden, where it was safe and I could keep an eye on them.
‘Will you play, Mummy?’ said Alfie.
‘Of course, darling, just let me have five minutes with Daddy and I’ll be with you.’
‘What time did you get to bed last night?’ I asked, sitting on the edge of the sunlounger next to his, as the children scattered about the garden.
‘Oh, two or three, I don’t know.’
‘Was anything said after I left?’
He looked at me. ‘Not really, it was just me and Jamie and… Ella. Everyone kept their thoughts to themselves and didn’t start accusing each other of terrible things,’ he said pointedly. ‘Ella was devastated.’
‘I didn’t… I still believe she took those—’
‘Stop it, Clare, just give it up, will you? Why on earth would Ella steal from her motherin-law?’
‘I don’t… She wanted the earrings, she liked them… she might sell them, I don’t know.’ I tried to keep my voice down so the kids couldn’t hear.
‘Exactly, you don’t know, so why accuse her? And why go on to criticise her for getting upset when she almost drowned, what’s wrong with you?’ he hissed.
‘Nothing… there’s nothing wrong with me.’ I glanced around to make sure no one else had arrived poolside yet. Any minute now Joy would emerge in a kaftan and matching swimwear and settle down on a nearby sunbed and, while feigning disinterest, would tune in to everything we said. I had to get Dan on side while I could.
‘I don’t know why she took the earrings – and I didn’t know about her sister,’ I said.
‘You can see why she’d be so upset though.’
‘Yes – of course, and in retrospect I shouldn’t have said anything about the pool incident, but I just felt she’d made a drama out of falling in, all the flailing around and—’
‘Oh, I didn’t realise there was etiquette involved in drowning. If there’s a book on “appropriate social responses while your lungs fill with water”， I’d love to read it,’ he snapped.
‘I take it you didn’t defend me in my absence last night then?’ I said, trying really hard not to cry, because I didn’t want to distress the children, and because if I started to cry, I might not be able to stop, I was so overwhelmed.
‘Defend you? How could I defend what you said? Ella was sobbing and Jamie was so angry, it took me ages to calm them both down.’
‘Are Joy and Bob angry with me too?’
‘Don’t know, they didn’t say much. They went to bed soon after you. Mum was upset more than angry, and Dad – well, you know what he’s like, just worried about Mum, I suppose.’
It used to be me, Dan and Jamie, but not any more; how quickly everything had changed.
Dan just continued to stare ahead, watching the kids play. ‘We only have a few days left – I just wish you’d kept your thoughts to yourself.’
‘That’s what the Taylors do, isn’t it?’ I said quietly. ‘They keep everything to themselves, brush it under the carpet. Your mum applies another layer of lipstick, your dad ignores it and we all pretend everything in the garden’s rosy.’
His jaw tightened. He was a loyal son and brother, the Taylors stuck by each other through thick and thin. ‘Sometimes we don’t like what we see, and it might not be brave, but it’s sometimes kinder to pretend it isn’t there,’ he said.
‘Muuuummy, come and find us, ready or not,’ Alfie was calling.
‘Yeah, Mum, you said you’d play too,’ Violet joined in.
‘I’ll be just a minute,’ I said, needing to finish this conversation with Dan. I stood up, tightening my sarong around me. ‘I know I probably should have kept quiet, it might have been the kindest – the wisest – thing to do, but I didn’t, that was my choice, and as far as the earrings go, I don’t regret saying something. Somebody had to and you weren’t going to.’