‘No, I don’t think that would be a good idea. Things aren’t going all that well for Tim at the moment—sales have dropped and there have been problems with delivery and installation. I keep telling Tim that he should be tougher, more assertive—’ She broke off, shaking her head.
‘Would you do it, Claire?’ she asked with unfamiliar humility. ‘Tim is getting himself in a dreadful state about the whole thing. Apparently this American, his new boss, is something of an… individual—’
‘An individual…? What does that mean?’ Claire asked her warily.
Irene started to frown. As Claire knew from past experience, likeable though her sister-in-law was, she was inclined to steamroller people in order to get her own way when it suited her, and Claire could tell that she wasn’t particularly pleased at having been interrupted and questioned.
‘I’m sure he’s not an awkward character. Oh, Claire, I wouldn’t ask you,’ Irene pleaded, ‘but Tim is feeling so vulnerable about his job at the moment. He has convinced himself that this American is coming in very much as a new broom; psychologically it will make him feel so much more confident if he feels that he’s done something constructive ahead of his arrival…’
‘“Something constructive”? Are you sure this man is going to want to be my lodger? From the sound of it, it seems to me that he’s used to a far more luxurious lifestyle than I enjoy. You know how quietly I live, Irene. I’ve never been a keen socialiser.’
‘No, maybe not, but people like you, Claire; they feel drawn to you—your house is always full of callers, your phone never stops ringing.’
Claire digested her comment in silence, knowing that it was an argument she could not refute.
John had often remonstrated with her about her tendency to attract people who needed a shoulder to cry on. The only time the big Edwardian house had ever really been quiet had been during those pitifully brief weeks leading up to John’s death, and then only because Claire had specifically asked people not to call. She still missed him dreadfully—his support, his wise counsel, his protection.
His protection.
A tiny tremor shook her body.
‘Irene, I don’t think that it would be a good idea… I—’
‘Oh, Claire, please.’
As Claire looked at her sister-in-law she could see that her anxiety was genuine. She gave a small sigh.
‘Very well, then,’ she agreed. ‘But I doubt that this man, Tim’s new boss, is going to be very thrilled when he discovers—’
‘Nonsense. Your house complies with all his stipulations,’ Irene told her, then proceeded to tick them off on her fingers as she listed them.
‘It’s a proper home right in the centre of the community—well, at least in the best residential part of the town. You’ve got a proper guest suite—or at least you will have now that Sally’s gone. He can have her old room and bathroom and he can use one of the other bedrooms as an office. After all, you have got five of them.
‘There’s a garden with adequate space for his car. He’ll be part of a large family network—’
‘What? There’s only me,’ Claire protested.
‘No, there’s not; there’s Sally and Chris and all his family and us, and you’ve got enough friends to fill a fair-sized church hall twice over. You’re a member at the sports club so you’ll be able to take him there and—’
‘I’ll be able to take him where? Hang on a minute, Irene…’ Claire started to protest, but her sister-in-law wasn’t listening to her any more.
She was standing up, reaching out to hug her affectionately and gratefully as she told her warmly and, Claire was sure, slightly triumphantly, ‘I knew you’d do it… It’s the perfect solution, after all. Tim will be so pleased and relieved. He was terrified that you might not agree, poor dear, especially since…’
‘Especially since what?’ Claire demanded suspiciously.
‘Well, it’s nothing really; it’s just that this man is due to arrive tomorrow and of course he’s going to expect Tim to have worked out his accommodation requirements. We’ve booked him into an hotel for the first couple of days…’
‘He’s arriving tomorrow?’ Claire protested, and demanded, ‘Irene, just how long have you known—?’
‘I must run,’ Irene interrupted her. ‘I’ve promised Mary I’ll give her a hand sorting out the cricket teas and I’m already late.
‘We’re picking Brad up from the airport when he arrives, and naturally we thought we ought to have him for dinner tomorrow evening. You’ll join us, of course. It will be an ideal opportunity for him to meet you and for you to make arrangements to show him the house…’
‘Irene…’ Claire started to remonstrate, but it was too late. Her sister-in-law was already beating a strategic retreat.
‘What on earth are you doing?’
Claire raised her flushed face from her kneeling position in the bathroom adjacent to the spare bedroom and put down her damp cloth.
She hadn’t heard her friend and next-door neighbour Hannah come in.
‘Clearing out this room ready for my new lodger,’ she told Hannah breathlessly, and quickly explained to her what had happened.
‘Oh, trust Irene; she really has pulled a fast one on you this time, hasn’t she?’ Hannah commented wryly. ‘A lodger, and single too, I imagine, otherwise he would be looking for a house to rent. Mmm… that’s going to cause a bit of excitement in the close… Wonder what he looks like…?’
‘I don’t know and I don’t care,’ Claire told her firmly, standing up and surveying the tiles she had just finished polishing with an abstracted frown, pushing one hand into her hair to lift its heavy weight off the nape of her neck.
Thick and naturally curly, its rich dark exuberance was the bane of her life. Sally often teased her enviously that, with her petite, small-boned frame and her small, heart-shaped face, framed by her glossy chestnut curls, she looked young enough to be her peer rather than almost a decade her senior.
‘You should be being one of my bridesmaids,’ Sally had teased her. ‘You certainly look young enough to get away with it.’
Claire had shaken her head over such foolishness. She was, she had reminded her stepdaughter, a mature woman of thirty-four.
‘A mature woman?’ Sally had scoffed unrepentantly. ‘You look more like a young girl. It’s odd, you know,’ she had added more seriously, ‘but, despite the fact that you’d been married to Dad for over ten years when he died, there’s still something almost… almost—well, virginal about you.’
She had given Claire a wry look as she’d spoken. ‘I know it sounds crazy but it’s true, there is, and I’m not the only one to think so. Chris noticed it as well…’
‘You’re unreal, do you know that?’ Hannah told her fondly now. ‘Here you are, an adult, fully functioning woman in the full power of her womanhood… without a man, and you turn round and tell me…’
As she saw the look Claire was giving her Hannah backed off, apologising.
‘All right, all right… So I know how close you and John were and how much you must still miss him. It just seems such a waste, that’s all. One thing does puzzle me, though; if this guy is Tim’s boss, what on earth is he doing looking for lodgings? Why doesn’t he—?’
‘He wants to live in a family home,’ Claire explained patiently, repeating what Irene had told her.
‘Apparently