Chapter Four
On Monday morning, Mats read to the children on Alvin’s bed, having luxurious amounts of dad-time while he was in Skye. A video call was due from Inger. The three of them lolled together on a mound of pillows decorated with planets. Alvin and Astrid, hair brushed and cute faces gleaming, kept switching their gazes from the book about a fox and a mole to an iPad, screen blank, propped up against an obliging blue teddy bear halfway down the bed.
Then: ‘I want to hold it,’ Alvin bellowed in Swedish, hurling himself over the book and seizing the iPad. The teddy bear somersaulted to the floor.
Astrid gave an outraged gasp. ‘You’re too little, isn’t he, Pappa?’ She tried to wrestle it from his hands.
‘Not, not,’ howled Alvin, his tiny fingers reddening as he clung harder.
‘Hey, hey,’ Mats crooned soothingly, lifting Astrid off Alvin and prising all fingers but his from what had been a freshly polished screen. ‘Nobody’s going to hold it. We propped it up against bear so it wouldn’t get broken, and everyone would be able to see when Mamma calls.’ He leant sideways to retrieve the toy, and then propped up the iPad once more. ‘Astrid, we might have to chat about your behaviour concerning your little brother. And both of you should remember we’re trying to talk English while we’re here,’ he added, remembering the fact. ‘So “Daddy” in English, OK?’
Astrid pointed at the toy bear without addressing her sistering skills. ‘He’s not called Bear, he’s called ?ke.’ She resettled herself against the pillows, her recently brushed hair now escaping from its scrunchie.
‘I not little,’ Alvin added inaccurately.
Mats was relieved when the bee-boop, bee-boop of an incoming video call hit the air.
‘Mamma!’ Alvin shouted, trying again to hurl himself at the iPad.
Mats scooped him up. ‘Sit nicely, and I’ll answer the call.’ His arms were long enough that he could reach the tablet without letting the children up from their pillows.
Inger appeared, relaxing on the curved seating of what was obviously the sumptuous deck of the superyacht she was living on. She smiled, and the whole screen seemed to light up. ‘Astrid, Alvin,’ she cooed in Swedish. ‘How lovely to see my darling babies. How are you? Are you having a nice time?’ Inger’s dark hair blew back from her face.
‘ Hej , Inger,’ said Mats, not bothering to ask that she conduct the call in English. The children would speak more naturally to their mother in their native language. A quick smile, then he retired to lounge on the floor, content to watch his children’s eager faces while they chattered. After a while he’d get Josefin to look after Astrid and Alvin while he and Inger discussed anything the children didn’t need to hear.
‘We’re in a place called Skye,’ Astrid boomed, adding in English, ‘But not that sky.’ She pointed upwards.
‘And we’re in our bedroom,’ Alvin declared, not to be outdone. ‘Josefin’s bedroom’s next door. And Farmor’s here, too.’
‘She’s downstairs. We came on planes, and we stayed in a hotel,’ Astrid put in.
‘There’s lots of outside here,’ Alvin added. Mats laughed aloud at this description of Rothach Hall’s extensive grounds.
From the iPad screen, Inger laughed too. ‘I know where you are. I’ve been to Rothach with you, when you were younger. You just don’t remember.’ Brightly, she added, ‘We’re cruising up the coast of Egypt. It’s sunny.’
Astrid looked at her big bedroom window. ‘It’s sunny here.’
‘But here it’s sunny and warm ,’ Inger pointed out.
‘Here we have icicles, just like at home,’ Astrid countered. The call proceeded with details of the children’s day so far – largely eating and watching TV, according to them, with no mention of getting fresh air while kicking a ball around the lawn or using their brains by doing puzzles with Farmor. Josefin came to the door and Mats beckoned her in. Once in the room, she angled her head beside the children’s. ‘ Hej, hej, Inger. Nice to see you. Astrid and Alvin have been excited about talking to you.’
‘I’ve been excited about talking to them,’ Inger claimed, although Mats wondered why she didn’t do it every day, in that case, or why she’d chosen to be away from them so long. He knew the answer of course … Andreas. Before he’d brought Inger into his circle, she hadn’t been quite so remote from her children. Mats hoped that after the cruise she’d have more time for them again.
After twenty minutes, the children’s attention began to wander. ‘Can we watch SpongeBob SquarePants ?’ Astrid asked Inger, as if she were in the room.
‘I should think so,’ Inger replied. ‘Is Josefin still nearby? Perhaps she’d put it on for you while I talk to Pappa. But don’t leave without blowing me kisses.’ When the children made ‘Mwah! Mwah!’ sounds and kissed their fingers, she laughingly returned their salutes.
Then the two little people raced through the bedroom door towards the playroom.
Mats took up the iPad and settled himself against Alvin’s bed. ‘They miss you,’ he said, because no matter how much he was enjoying so much time with his kids, he felt it should be said. It would be the first Christmas the children wouldn’t see their mother.
‘Don’t, Mats,’ she said with affected weariness. ‘I know you disapprove of my holiday, but the children are fine and I’m getting the experience of a lifetime.’
‘You are, aren’t you,’ agreed blandly, without commenting on her immediately leaping to her own defence when he mentioned the children missing her. ‘But it’s what you changed partners for, right? I had enough money for you, but not enough time. You blamed that when you fell for Andreas.’ And she’d always refused to acknowledge that Mats’ long hours spent earning money meant only a few weeks a year for idling around on luxury holidays. Mats still winced when he remembered the day Erik had overheard her telling a friend that Mats’ family ‘made their money out of fishcakes. Fishcakes! I’d almost rather it was urinal cakes.’ Stung to find himself looked down upon, Erik had flamed with indignation.
‘Anyway,’ Mats said, as raking up old grievances was unproductive. ‘I’m glad you were able to chat to the children. They’re fine, and when the rest of the family come for Christmas, they’ll be even better.’
Evidently seeing this as a barbed comment she answered, ‘We’d already agreed that the children would spend this Christmas with you on the Isle of Skye,’ as if him taking them away for what had originally been planned for three weeks had been the sole reason that she’d accepted an invitation for a cruise that lasted three months . Her hand loomed briefly then her image vanished.
He sighed at the abrupt end to the call, carried the tablet back to his room next door and shoved it onto his bedside. Inger’s default setting was to make herself feel good by shining a light on what she saw as the faults of others, but the exchange had left him ruffled and resentful. He’d hoped to get a clearer idea of when she intended to return home to Sweden. His gaze strayed to the windows in this room they used to share and where they’d enjoyed happy times, in the early days of their marriage. The curtains Inger had chosen were of wildly expensive fabric, but he thought the views through them were far more beautiful. One window looked over the lawns and drive to the glittering Sound of Sleat, with a lone fishing boat drawing an arrow on the calm water. Another window showed rippling greensward. Pivoting, through the last two he could see the family garden and the copse beyond. As Alvin had said, there was ‘lots of outside here’.
On a sudden fit of energy, he jogged down the hall to the playroom, bursting in on Josefin helping Alvin build a Duplo tower while Astrid was glued to SpongeBob on the TV.
‘Who wants to come exploring?’ Mats cried, in the manner of one offering a humungous treat.
‘Yeah!’ Alvin bellowed, leaping to his little feet and scattering the Duplo tower as he raced headlong for Mats.
Astrid peeped out of the corner of her eye. ‘I’m watching SpongeBob .’
Mats swung Alvin up onto his shoulder. ‘OK. You girls stay indoors, and we men will go out—’
‘Coming!’ Astrid declared hurriedly.
Josefin began to climb to her feet, her big smile filling the space between her round cheeks. Mats halted her. ‘You have an hour to yourself, Josefin. I’ll be fine with the kids. After all, you’re missing Christmas with your sister and family this year and deserve extra downtime at least.’
Surprise flickered over her face. ‘If you’re sure.’ She subsided onto the floor and began to gather up Duplo bricks: red, yellow, blue and green.
He hoped he hadn’t offended her. Being a nanny was an odd position. It was almost family. Attached to the family. But not family. Josefin had few external ties other than friends in Sweden and an adult son in California, and he almost said, ‘Unless you’d like to come?’ But part of the attraction of his leave of absence was spending more time with his children, so he called, ‘Boots and jackets on,’ swinging Alvin to the floor. ‘Don’t run on the stairs.’ Astrid was already sprinting up the corridor.
‘I faster than Astrid,’ Alvin cried, which, as he was panting in her wake, was demonstrably untrue.
Downstairs in the cloakroom, they began the process of dressing in outdoor clothes, which took at least twice as long as necessary.
‘Don’t want that yacket,’ declared Alvin.
‘It’s a jacket ,’ Astrid corrected him. ‘Those aren’t my boots.’
‘Can I have yellow scarf? I lost a strumpe -sock.’
‘That means sock-sock! I don’t like mittens. Where are my gloves?’
‘I don’t need help. I do it MYSELF.’
‘I need a wee. I’ll just take my coat off …’
‘I need a wee, too.’ In an instant, two children were bickering over who’d go first, and coats, boots, scarves and gloves were shed across the cloakroom floor. Mats thought ruefully that Josefin would have asked who needed the toilet before even thinking about outdoor clothes.
Finally, finally, they were suited and booted and in the crisp outdoors under a blue sky scattered with towering clouds. Mats said, ‘Hold my hand down the steps, please.’ And then they were all running across the grass in air so cold and fresh it made him giddy as he breathed the scents of pine needles and the sea. Mats took one of Alvin’s hands and when Astrid grabbed the other, his little red boots barely touched the ground.
Astrid’s giggles floated from her mouth like bubbles of joy. ‘We can run fast, can’t we, Daddy? We can run a long, long way.’
It turned out they could run about a hundred metres before the breathless children wanted to pause to examine worm casts in the lawn and then fling themselves on the grass and wriggle, pretending they were worms themselves. Mats took a philosophical attitude. Children and dirt went together. The washing machine would take care of it.
Surrounded by the giggles of happy children, he looked back at the house, admiring the grey stone that somehow never looked cold, and the turret under its conical hat. The wind combed the grass from side to side like a giant hand stroking green velvet. Then he turned his face towards the sea, letting his hair blow back. Across the sound, it was hard to tell which dark humps were the mainland and which were clouds. They piled up together on the horizon like a heap of grey, purple and white duvets.
When the children abandoned the worm game and meandered down the sloping grass, he strolled behind. The visitors’ car park was empty today and he was glad. Whenever he’d visited Rothach in the summer, the public had roamed the major part of the grounds while his family kept to their allotted areas in hall and gardens. Rothach Hall being a visitor attraction helped with the costs of an enormous, expensive property but it was great to have the place to themselves.
He remembered that the old donkey and pony Grete had allowed to retire here had been joined by new friends recently. ‘Hey, I have something to show you.’ With Alvin on his shoulders and Astrid skipping beside him, they battled the wind down to near the stone hump-backed bridge over the stream – or ‘burn’, as that was the Scottish name for it.
‘Horsies,’ Alvin squealed from his vantage point on Mats’ shoulders, as the paddock come into view.
Mats grabbed Astrid so she couldn’t blast up to the paddock and frighten the animals. ‘Small horses are called ponies. Three are ponies, and one’s a donkey.’ They drew near enough for him to read the notice on the metal gate. ‘Look, that sign says: “Mary Pony and Clive Donkey”. I remember your cousins Emil and Filip painting it. That’s Clive Donkey, with the funny sticky-up mane, and Mary Pony with grey around her eyes. Farmor told me about the other two ponies. They’re called Haggis and Scotch.’
‘Which is which?’ asked Astrid, gazing from a stocky bronze-coloured pony to a shaggy, friendly-looking one with a body the colour of the froth on hot chocolate but a darker face.
Mats considered. ‘I’d guess the bronze one is Scotch, because it’s roughly the colour of whisky.’
Alvin, who Mats had thought would be out of mischief up on his shoulders, suddenly flung up his arms and shrieked an ear-splitting ‘Yah!’
Mary and Clive tossed their heads, snorting like dragons and rolling their eyes, while Scotch and Haggis cantered away over the rough grass. ‘Alvin,’ Mats reproved. ‘That’s not nice behaviour.’
He swung the little boy down to solid ground. Though the reproof had been mild and his descent to earth gentle, Alvin burst into tears. ‘I want to see Mam-ma,’ he sobbed, reverting to Swedish in his upset.
‘So do I,’ declared Astrid, looking suddenly unhappy.
Mats crouched down to encircle both children in his arms. ‘You’ve just seen Mamma. You talked for ages.’
Astrid’s lips trembled. She looked a lot like Inger when she did that. ‘We want to see proper Mamma. Real Mamma. Not on the iPad.’
‘Oh, dear.’ Mats hugged them harder. ‘We can try to talk to her again on my phone, if you want.’ But the children only knuckled their eyes and sniffed, looking small and vulnerable in the magnificent landscape of grass and rock, sea and trees.
‘Playthings, then,’ Mats said, swinging Alvin back up onto his shoulders. ‘I’ll bet we have them all to ourselves.’
Astrid looked up through the dirty circles that had appeared from rubbing her eyes with grubby hands. ‘What kind of playthings?’
‘Wait and see,’ he said mysteriously, and led the way, chattering about how tall the pine trees were and that the formal bit of garden was called a knot garden, which Farmor liked, then past the bare twigs that graced the walled garden, and there it was – a playground made of wood, which would swarm with visitors in summer but was now still and empty.
‘Swings,’ Astrid cried, dropping his hand and beginning to run.
‘And me,’ Alvin shrieked urgently, kicking against Mats’ chest as if he was urging on one of the ponies.
‘Ouch.’ Mats laughed, swinging him down to the damp ground. ‘Let’s go see that wooden fort.’
Astrid, hearing this, changed course for the fort. ‘We can be soldiers.’
The log fort was so substantial that even Mats clambered up onto it, as there was no one to see him ignore the signs that said the apparatus was for under-fourteens. He could only take two strides before making an about-turn, but Astrid, bossier than any drill sergeant he’d encountered when on compulsory basic training in Sweden, gave him so many contradictory orders it was easiest to march on the spot. Hair blowing crazily in his eyes, he shouldered an imaginary rifle and marched with a jerky gait to make the children giggle.
And then Alvin shouted, ‘ Hall?! Hello!’
Mats spun around to see Ezz with a member of staff he knew to be the head gardener and Ezzie’s sister, and his buffoonery faltered.
‘Hello,’ both women called back, wearing polite smiles. Thea was buried in an enormous fleece, cargo trousers and work boots. Most of her dark hair was covered by a green woolly hat. Ezz was wrapped in a stylish black coat with twin rows of buttons and her blonde hair flew around her head.
Mats felt like a prize fool but prepared to style it out. ‘Um, hello.’
‘We been to see horsies,’ crowed Alvin, his tears of a few minutes ago forgotten.
‘Aren’t they fab?’ Ezzie answered. ‘This is my sister, Thea. She’s one of the people who feeds the ponies and the donkey in winter.’
‘Your sister ?’ the children chorused in tones of disbelief, as if adults couldn’t possibly have siblings.
Astrid turned inquisitor. ‘Do you live in the same house? Or do you live here at the hall?’
‘Different houses, but the same village,’ Ezz answered gravely.
‘What village?’ she demanded.
‘Rothach village,’ Thea said. ‘It has a beach.’
‘Quite a rocky beach,’ Ezz chimed in. ‘The sand isn’t great for sandcastles. Our nephew likes the rock pools though. Enjoy the playground,’ she added to the children – presumably – and then they said goodbye and hurried away towards the hall, Ezzie’s smart black ankle boots tapping on the path.
A few drops of rain blew suddenly against Mats’ face and automatically he turned to the children to pull up their hoods. ‘Time for hot chocolate, I think.’ He felt oddly deflated that Thea and Ezzie hadn’t lingered to chat but sped away as if he’d offended them.
Abruptly, he remembered inadvertently leaving Ezzie to climb on a stool to empty the luggage box when they’d arrived from the airport and he glanced after her. He’d meant to apologise for that but had forgotten when he’d asked her to take Josefin out and for a split second she’d looked appalled, before her usual courteous mask had slipped back in place.
The appalled look had made him curious. He was sure it had been a glimpse beneath the bland, professional mask Ezzie Wynter habitually wore, a clue to the inner life of the pretty, composed woman.
Yet he hadn’t understood that look at all.