Chapter 20
We got back to the hotel just after five o’clock, and tired and slightly sunburned but happy, we piled off the minibus and into the cool of the reception area.
I looked back as I reached the staircase to see Will outside on his phone, pacing back and forth as most men seem to do when they are on a call.
He was looking rather serious and doing more listening than talking by the looks of things.
I went to my room, looking forward to seeing him later and wondering what was left in my limited wardrobe choices to wear for this last evening meal.
Actually, I wasn’t particularly hungry because true to his promise, Will had come to inspect my painting and then bought me a delicious pistachio ice cream as a reward.
And it wasn’t one of the usual and rather unsatisfactory ice creams I expected where the scoop was small and the cone had the taste and texture of stale paper.
This one was three huge blobs of pale green deliciousness in a waffle cone with the edge dipped in chocolate.
Perhaps I didn’t need anything else to eat after all.
I had a quick shower and changed into my rose-printed sundress, which was made of some sort of miraculous material which didn’t seem to crease even though it had fallen off the hanger unnoticed and had been lying crumpled up on the floor of the wardrobe, so a win as far as I was concerned.
And then I pulled on a white cotton cardigan I had forgotten about and some sandals and I was ready to go.
Before I left the room, I refilled the saucer of water I had been leaving out for the kittens on the balcony, and while I was out there, a taxi pulled up.
It was Hector, and seconds later I saw Will put his suitcase in the back and then he got in.
I watched, puzzled, as the taxi pulled away. What on earth was going on?
* * *
If anyone would know it would be Jillian, and I found her downstairs in the courtyard, poring over some sheets of paper looking cross.
‘Where’s Will gone? I just saw him getting into a taxi.’
She looked up at me briefly, obviously annoyed at being distracted from her paperwork.
‘To the airport. He said he needed to get an earlier flight.’
‘Why?’
She pulled a face, grabbed a sheet of paper from the bundle and ripped it up.
‘I’ve no idea. Perhaps he’d had enough. He was very brusque with me.
And I was right in the middle of sorting out the group for next week.
There are going to be fourteen of them. How I will keep them in order is anyone’s guess.
It’s been hard enough with just eight of you, darting off in all directions. ’
‘So, he didn’t say anything?’ I said hopefully.
Jillian shuffled her papers into some sort of order and scrabbled around on the table looking for a paperclip.
‘He just said thanks for everything; he was going to the airport. Perhaps you should have asked him? Honestly, I do what I can to foster a good group vibe, but sometimes it doesn’t work. It’s disappointing for me too, you know.’
‘Yes, I’m sure it is,’ I said.
Jillian was working herself up by then, obviously annoyed.
‘Some groups just gel right from the start. I had a lovely group of twelve a few weeks ago. Everyone interacting and friendly. And sometimes it’s not like that.
Take this week for example. Only a small group and yet there’s been no cohesion, do you see?
People are here to paint, not just wander off enjoying themselves.
I never seem to know where June and Susan are.
Dennis is always badgering me asking for tips or to borrow my penknife to sharpen his pencils because he had his confiscated at the airport. And – well…’
She stopped before she could get on to me and the others, or me and Will if she had noticed.
‘I see,’ I said.
‘But then, don’t get me wrong, I have enjoyed getting to know you all,’ she added hastily.
‘Personally, I have found this week an incredible help, even if I haven’t produced much art.’
Jillian had been rummaging in her briefcase and she looked up, puzzled.
‘Have you? In what way?’
‘It’s given me a new perspective on my life. Time to think and see where I need to make changes. And to me that has been more valuable than any amount of sketching.’
Jillian gave me a puzzled stare.
‘I just assumed you weren’t getting much out of it. Or your friends. You just seemed to want to go off on your own all the time.’
‘Everyone needs space sometimes,’ I said.
‘The time to plan and consider what to do next. None of us are in the first flush of youth, and we all have worries and problems. And being at home can mean there is no time to deal with them before someone else needs something or wants to chat. Trust me, it’s made a lot of difference to me.
If nothing else it has shown me how to have fun again.
You often seem so stressed and worried, you should try it. ’
‘I have been feeling in need of a rest,’ Jillian agreed, clutching her paperwork to her chest, ‘but of course my life is great. Wonderful. Living here. The people and the climate. I know just about everyone and every street. It’s all so lovely. What have I got to complain about?’
‘Perhaps you need a holiday from your holiday,’ I said, and she smiled, the lines of tension fading from her face for the first time.
‘Maybe I do.’
‘Well, I’ll see you later,’ I murmured and hurried away to find the others.
I was glad that perhaps she might take my advice, because with a dispassionate eye I could see her life might not be quite as idyllic as she made out.
Effie had found out that her long-time partner had left the previous year and gone off to work on a cruise ship.
I could see that Jillian was lonely. Maybe the feeling that she had control of this part of her life was more important to her than we had realised.
I thought about this for a few seconds and felt a bit guilty.
And then I went back to thinking about Will and I was suddenly very disappointed.
Apart from anything else, how rude of him, to leave like that.
To spend that time with me, to take my hand, smile into my eyes and kiss me, to make me feel as though there was something between us that was different.
And then just disappear without even saying goodbye.
But perhaps he was ill, maybe that was it? He needed to get back for an urgent medical appointment. Or perhaps his new kitchen had flooded or there had been some other domestic disaster with his house renovation.
I pulled myself up; I was doing what I had always done with Malcolm: make excuses for inexcusable behaviour. More fool me.
Still, I did want to understand what had happened, and like generations of women before me, I had started off by assuming it was my fault.
Perhaps despite everything he had come to the end of his flirting abilities. Perhaps he was bored by it all and didn’t know how to get out of it? So instead of having a conversation he just did a runner.
For goodness’ sake, what was the matter with people, that they thought it was okay to be so cowardly and discourteous? I hadn’t behaved in an annoying, stalkerish way.
I imagined myself spilling the beans to the others; they were bound to ask. They had been so confident that the Old Duck magic always worked. Well, evidently not in this case.
* * *
Will’s absence at dinner was noticed, of course, and people wanted to know where he was on this last evening together, when Jillian was waxing unexpectedly lyrical about what a great group we had been, how she was sure some of us would return another year and how we would always be welcome.
Which, in view of what she had said to me on the quiet, was a bit rich.
And then she said she was going to take a break when the summer season was over and visit Cassandra, and she hoped she would see some of us again when she did. And we all said we hoped so too, and she gave the first real smile since we had met her.
* * *
‘There’s a proper word for what Will did, isn’t there?’ Anita said later when we were sitting up on the roof terrace after dinner.
‘Rude?’ Beryl suggested.
‘No – it’s called ghosting,’ Anita said.
‘I’ve read about that. A couple get together and everything seems to be going fine and then out of the blue one of them simply disappears.
I had a friend who had that,’ Effie said.
‘She met Lionel through their local bowls club and they had afternoon tea twice, and he was even talking about them pairing up for some tournament in the summer. In Torquay. Pauline got very excited. She was practically packing her case, and then nothing. He disappeared off the radar, never returned her calls. She was very upset.’
‘So what happened?’ I asked.
‘She found out six months later he’d been run over.
In the high street. He wasn’t badly hurt, just a mild concussion and a bruised knee.
But someone said they thought he had joined another team in Chichester.
And apparently he had left his thermos in his locker at the bowls club, and some cheese sandwiches.
By the time they opened it she said it looked like Day of the Triffids in there. ’
‘That’s not quite the same thing,’ Anita said reasonably. ‘He might have had amnesia.’
‘No, Pauline said he had a wife, and a lady friend in West Wittering.’
‘Oh, it doesn’t matter,’ I said, ‘let’s talk about something else. I’m a bit hurt, but it’ll pass.’
Beryl leaned over and patted my arm consolingly.
‘Of course it will pass. It might pass like a kidney stone, which I’ve heard can be very unpleasant, but you’ll be fine. I have to admit, I’m surprised though. Now then, I was thinking of ordering some drinks from Costas. What do you think?’
‘Is that wise? We have to be out of our rooms by ten thirty tomorrow,’ Anita said.