Chapter Fifty-Seven
The conversation meandered on a while longer around the table, but everyone was tired and their energy was waning. Finally Jude stretched out his arms and yawned. ‘I can barely keep my eyes open.’
‘There are five guest bedrooms on the top floor,’ Wesley told him. ‘Use any one of them you want.’
‘My stuff’s in the car,’ Jude said to Ben.
Ben was hardly listening. His mind still entirely focused on his thoughts, he vaguely dug the car keys from his pocket and slid them across the table. Jude snatched them up and went outside. They’d left the rental Jeep a little way up the empty beach road, the other side of the dunes.
‘He reminds me a lot of his father,’ Wesley said when Jude was gone. ‘Not so much physically, but he’s got Simeon’s spirit. He’s a good kid. I guess it’s my fault that he has to suffer this. If I hadn’t gotten his father mixed up in it all …’
Ben still found it hard to adapt to knowing whose son Jude really was. ‘He’s tough. He’ll come through it.’
As they talked, they heard Jude come back in from the car and go hustling up the stairs.
‘What’ll he do now, with his folks gone?’ Wesley asked, more quietly in case he was overheard.
‘I’m not sure,’ Ben said. ‘He might finish his studies, or else he talked about joining up with Greenpeace, trying to get himself a placement on one of their ships. He’d like to do something to help the environment.’
If Wesley Holland the arch-capitalist had any problems with that, he didn’t show it. ‘Simeon had hoped he might follow him into the ministry one day.’
‘I’d say there’s not too much chance of that,’ Ben said.
‘Whatever he wants to do, if he needs money …’
‘Kind of you to offer,’ Ben said. He’d already decided that he’d ensure as best he could that Jude was financially secure. The tricky part might be getting him to accept help.
‘Well, anyway, I’m just about done in myself,’ Wesley said, stifling a yawn. ‘Time to hit the sack.’ He stood up and picked the sword off the table. ‘I’ll put this back in the vault in the morning. Keep it by me for now.’
When he was alone, Ben walked out of the front door and onto the broad terrace that separated the house’s facade from the beach. He lit up a Gauloise and spent a while watching the dark waves rolling in, listening to the roar of the surf. The wind was cold, rustling through the reeds that grew among the dunes. Stars twinkled overhead and the lights of the distant marine observatory tower glowed dimly red over the ocean.
Feeling demoralised and as tired as he could remember having ever felt in his life, Ben stubbed out the cigarette, tossed the smoking butt away into the sand and then returned inside and climbed the stairs.
The top floor of the house was dark except for the light shining from a door on the left, which was open a few inches. It was the guest bedroom that Jude had picked out for himself, facing towards the sea. He was sitting on the bed, silent and still. All Ben could see of him through the gap in the door was his foot and part of his leg. He was still dressed and wearing his shoes.
‘Good night,’ Ben said quietly outside the doorway.
No reply. Ben tapped lightly on the door. ‘See you in the morning.’ When there was still no response from inside, he pushed open the door. ‘Jude? Are you all right?’
Jude looked up as Ben appeared in the doorway. His face was tight and pale.
Ben stared back at him, realising that something was wrong.
And felt the blood rapidly drain out of his body into his feet.
Propped up beside the bed, next to Jude’s own rucksack, was his green canvas bag. Jude had brought it in from the car.
And in Jude’s hands was the small sheet of sky-blue paper, creased in the middle, that Ben had been keeping hidden in there. Michaela’s letter.
Ben didn’t move, or step forward to snatch it from him, or say ‘Give me that’. It was too late. Jude knew.
‘I thought I recognised her writing,’ Jude said quietly. ‘In Jerusalem. I pretended I hadn’t noticed what you were reading. Wanted to take another look ever since.’
Ben didn’t know what to say.
‘Were you ever going to tell me?’ Jude asked.
‘No,’ Ben replied. ‘I wasn’t ever going to tell you.’
‘Then you should have just burned this.’
‘I couldn’t,’ Ben said. Anger welled up inside him. Why hadn’t he had the courage to destroy it? It was stupid and sentimental and selfish to have kept it and risked letting Jude find it.
‘You’ve all lied to me,’ Jude muttered. The letter was fluttering slightly in his hands.
‘I know it looks bad. But they thought it was for the best.’
‘For the best! To believe in a lie, for all these years?
‘It’s been a shock for me too,’ Ben said. ‘I didn’t read it until we were in France. I had no idea until then. You have to believe me, Jude.’
‘You and my mum—’
‘It was a long time ago. We were young. These things happen.’
‘And he knew about it all along?’ Jude said, seething with anger.
‘Simeon?’
‘What kind of man would do that? Pretend to be the father of another man’s kid?’
‘The best kind,’ Ben said. ‘He loved you. You couldn’t have asked for a better father.’
‘Except he wasn’t, was he?’ Jude said bitterly. ‘He was a liar and a fraud. So much for the good upstanding vicar, the great Christian with all his high-and-mighty fucking morals.’
Ben stepped forward. ‘Jude—’
‘Get the fuck away from me. You’re not my father. I’ll never see you that way.’
‘I don’t expect you to. I don’t even know how to be a father.’
Jude leaped up from the bed, red-faced. He scrunched the letter into a tight ball and clenched it in his fist. ‘This is bullshit!’ he yelled. Grabbing his rucksack off the floor, he slung it violently over his shoulder and started pushing his way past Ben towards the door.
‘Where are you going?’
‘As far away from you as possible.’
‘You’re on an island,’ Ben said. ‘You can’t go anywhere.’
‘I’ll swim home if I have to. What do you care, anyway?’
‘Hey. Come on. Don’t act this way. We can talk about it.’
‘Fuck you, Dad.’
‘I’m not your dad,’ Ben said, trying to restrain his rising temper. ‘Simeon Arundel was, is, your dad, and you should be proud to say so. The rest counts for nothing. Jude! Come back!’
But Jude wasn’t listening. He stormed out onto the landing and started running down the stairs. Ben raced out after him. He stopped at the top of the stairs, gripping the banister rail. ‘Oh, shit,’ he groaned to himself, scarcely able to believe this was happening. It was all his fault. He should never have let Jude see the letter.
But recriminations and self-blame could wait for now. After a moment’s hesitation, he plunged down the stairs after Jude. As he reached the bottom, the front door was swinging on its hinges. He flicked on a side-lamp in the entrance