The Secrets Between Us by Louise Douglas Read Free Book Online Page B

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    The house sat in its own gardens, separated from the orchard by walls at the front and a barbed-wire fence at the back. A substantial wooden porch, overwound with honeysuckle so old that its main stems were as thick as my wrists, stood slightly lopsided before the front door. There were windows on either side of the porch and above it. It looked as if the original house had been extended to the side and backwards, or maybe it had just been built in a ramshackle way, with extra rooms added on as afterthoughts. A couple of tiles had slipped from the roof and the dun-coloured plaster that rendered the old stone walls was peeling in huge, papery flakes. The flower beds in the garden were untidy and overgrown but it was clear from the faded blooms on the stems of the roses and the colours and shapes of the shrubs, now jostling for light and space, that at one time the garden had been beautiful.
    ‘It’s a mess,’ Alexander said, following my eyes. ‘Genevieve was too busy with her horses to bother with the garden and I haven’t had the time.’
    ‘She’s a rider?’
    ‘Yep.’
    ‘She might be in the Olympics,’ Jamie said.
    I laughed. I thought he was joking, then I remembered that Jamie was not a frivolous child. He looked at me crossly and immediately I tried to make up for my reaction by saying: ‘You mean she’s a really good rider?’
    ‘One of the best,’ said Alexander.
    ‘Oh. Does she do show-jumping?’
    ‘Eventing,’ Alexander said. ‘Dressage, show-jumping and cross-country. A lot of people are into it round here.’
    ‘You don’t get much of that in Manchester,’ I said.
    Alexander smiled at me.
    ‘Where are the horses?’
    ‘Genevieve’s mother’s looking after them for the time being. She … well, I’ll tell you later. This way,’ he said.
    I followed him through a wooden gate and up a small, flagstoned path to a side door that opened into a whitewashed room full of boots, stacks of newspapers, empty wine and vodka bottles and other things waiting to be recycled, unwashed laundry and cobwebs. One whole wall was covered with shiny rosettes, mostly red, and a couple of rope horse-collars hung from a metal hook beneath the window. Grooming equipment and a rusty tin of hoof oil were packed into a blue plastic pail. Riding coats and boots were heaped in one corner together with an assortment of heavy-duty rope, metal and leather kit that must have been something to do with horses. A misshapen cardboard carton of washing powder lurched on top of a washing machine in the far corner of the room and an old dog bed lay beside it.
    A second door led into the kitchen, which was large, warm and untidy. Soiled crockery was stacked in the sink, and a cat stood on the counter eating the remains of a chicken carcass. The floor looked as if it had not been washed in weeks and the windows were grimy.
    Alexander put my bag down, shooed the cat from the chicken and turned the dish round. There was little meat left.
    ‘Bollocks,’ he said. ‘I was going to make us a sandwich for dinner.’
    The cat had a self-satisfied look on its face. It jumped on to the kitchen table and cleaned its paws, licking its fur with its tiny pink tongue.
    Alexander sighed. ‘It doesn’t even belong to us. It just comes in and steals our food.’
    Jamie went over to the cat and stroked it. The cat ignored him.
    ‘I’m sorry,’ said Alexander. ‘This isn’t much of a welcome. We were going to have a tidy round, weren’t we, Jamie?’
    Jamie scowled and put his head on the table. He watched the cat.
    ‘Only I had to work late so Jamie had tea round at his cousins’ house and between us we got nothing done.’
    ‘It’s OK,’ I said. ‘That’s why I’m here, isn’t it? To help sort things out.’
    Alexander looked bone tired. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘That’s why you’re here.’

CHAPTER NINE
    ALEXANDER MADE A pot of tea. I was touched that he went to the trouble of the teapot rather than simply putting