Chapter 58 #2
‘Oh, we don’t want to impose,’ said Isobel.
Oliver stood. ‘Not at all.’ He waved a hand. ‘Come in and join us.’
‘Yes – come in,’ said Bridie, smiling at them both.
Bridie walked over to Oliver and whispered, ‘As you know, that coffee machine has got quite the reputation.’
‘I suppose I’ll have to get used to this if I’m going to stay here with you until your cottage is renovated.’
‘Our cottage. Our home.’ Bridie smiled. She liked the sound of that very much – our home. And right next door to her favourite place too.
As she made coffee, she was thinking about the ticket sales which had far, far exceeded her expectations. It appeared that the whole town, along with the outlying villages, had really shown their support for the theatre, and now the first performance was a sell-out show.
But it wasn’t just one performance they were staging. Tickets were still selling out for the other performances; they’d decided the show was going to have at least a three-month run. And then they would plan another show. She was so excited to be running her very own theatre.
She handed mugs of coffee to Reggie, Isobel and Oliver. But who had owned it before? It was still a mystery.
Reggie and Isobel shuffled along the sofa. ‘Come, sit with us,’ Isobel said.
Bridie smiled affectionately at them both as she took a seat between them on the sofa.
Reggie leaned forward to put his mug on the coffee table, the locket around his neck dangling in front of him. Bridie said, ‘May I see it?’
‘Oh, I … um …’ He looked at Isobel.
Isobel smiled. ‘Show her.’
Reggie took it off and hesitated before he handed it over.
Bridie carefully opened it. Isobel and Reggie peered at it too. Bridie saw the photo of Reggie she’d missed the first time round when Maisie had shown her the locket and the photo of the cute baby inside.
Oliver said, ‘Who’s the baby?’ He looked at Isobel, wide-eyed. ‘Sorry, that’s none of my business.’
‘Ah, but it is,’ said Isobel, her gaze shifting to Bridie. ‘She’s sitting right next to you.’
Oliver shifted his gaze from Bridie, nodding at him and smiling, to Isobel. ‘I thought I saw the resemblance between you and Bridie. So, you guys really are Bridie’s—?’
‘We are.’ Isobel reached for Bridie’s hand and squeezed it tight.
Reggie turned to Bridie. ‘I wanted to tell you so much, Bridie, but Rufus … he didn’t want to cause you anymore heartache, finding out so much all at once. And neither did we.’
‘It’s what you were talking about, wasn’t it? In the ambulance after I left.’
Isobel nodded.
Reggie said, ‘When you used to visit Cobblers Yard as a teenager, of course I saw the resemblance, but I thought Rufus and Isobel had been together, you know, had an affair, and that’s why she’d suddenly disappeared from the show, to have the baby, and for some reason, arranged for Rufus and Claire to bring you up.
But I was wrong. Rufus genuinely thought you were a foundling, until later when he saw the resemblance too.
That’s when he realised Isobel was your mother, and the father was someone in the theatre troupe – me. ’
‘It’s why he avoided Aldeburgh, especially Cobblers Yard,’ said Bridie knowingly.
‘Yes, guilty conscience and all that. You see, Claire thought he’d had an affair, but if he told her the truth, then she’d see it was her moral duty to look for … well, me. But then the whole truth might come out that they weren’t your parents. Rufus didn’t want to lose you.’
‘Damned if he did and damned if he didn’t,’ said Isobel sadly.
‘Are you all still … friends?’ Bridie ventured, wondering how that could be after Rufus had kept the truth from him all these years.
Reggie smiled. ‘Rufus and Claire are good people – the best, actually. You’ve grown up with loving parents and siblings. There’s no point crying over spilt milk, Bridie. The past is the past, and nothing can change that.’
Isobel nodded in agreement.
‘Rufus loves you so very much, Bridie,’ Reggie continued.
‘I wasn’t there when Isobel left you on the doorstep of the theatre.
It was Rufus who found you, and by the time he realised the truth, it was too late.
You were their child. You’d grown up with them.
Even if Rufus had come and told me the truth, I could never have taken you away from your parents.
And I know you’ve always had a very close relationship with your paternal grandad. ’
Thinking of whom, Bridie said to Isobel, ‘I realised you were the woman my neighbour talked of, the one who used to visit Grandad, and who I resembled.’
‘Yes, he knew the truth about me … and you, but they fell out over not telling you the truth. I understood. Rufus didn’t want to hurt you, and he was afraid, they both were, Rufus and Claire, that you would do something like disown them if you found out the truth they’d kept from you about your past.’
‘I wouldn’t do that. They raised me.’
‘And that’s what makes them your parents.’
‘Yes, but you are still my mother and father.’
Reggie tentatively said, ‘Can I … can I really be your father?’
She smiled, reached out, and took his hand. ‘Yes. It’s never too late, Reggie.’ She took Isobel’s hand too. ‘Never too late.’ She glanced at Oliver, who sat there opposite them, smiling. He’d be the first to agree.
Bridie said, ‘There’s so much I want to ask you, about your lives in the theatre, about you.’
Reggie smiled. ‘There will be plenty of time for that.’ He glanced at Oliver. ‘You will be here for a while, won’t you, in Cobblers Yard?’
‘Oh, yes. I’m not going anywhere.’
‘Good,’ said Reggie and Isobel together.
‘Not right now, anyway,’ Oliver added.
‘Jack’s restoring a cottage for us to live in, next door to the theatre.’
‘Restoring?’ Reggie slapped his knee. ‘I told someone once that leopards can change their spots.’
Oliver laughed. ‘They can indeed. Sometimes they just need a special someone to point them in the right direction.’
Isobel finished her coffee. ‘Well, we shall leave you two lovebirds in peace.’
Oliver grinned. ‘I don’t think we’re the only lovebirds in Cobblers Yard tonight.’
Isobel said, ‘I’m not going anywhere anytime soon either.’
Bridie walked them to the door and gave each of them a hug. ‘You both explain a lot.’
‘About you?’ Reggie asked.
Bridie nodded. ‘Yes, about me. It all makes sense. I make sense.’
She watched them cross the cobbled yard to Reggie’s shop a second time and returned their wave before closing the shop door.
Oliver said, ‘Did one of them give you the theatre?’
Bridie shook her head. ‘No. I’m still completely in the dark over that.’ She looked at him. ‘Any ideas?’
‘Not a clue. Perhaps whoever it is will come to the opening night of your show?’
‘I was thinking the same thing.’ She crossed the room. ‘But let’s forget the theatre right now. I’ve finished my coffee.’
Oliver glanced at his empty mug. ‘Me too.’
She raised her eyes. ‘Shall we go upstairs?’ She suddenly felt absurdly embarrassed about how old-fashioned it was with the second-hand sofa, and old furnishings, even though Oliver had seen it all before. She said as much.
‘I don’t care about that.’ He stood up and took her in his arms. ‘Bridie, wherever you are, that’s my home.’
A howl interrupted the moment.
‘And wherever Barney is too, of course.’
They both stood there laughing. It took them back to those happy teenage years. This time, they both realised, was different; they were finally together, and they’d never be parted again.