Josephine Cox Sunday Times Bestsellers Collection. Josephine Cox

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       Chapter 20

      IT WAS THE day before the Davidson family were due to sail. The mood in the farmhouse was one of excitement, though it was tempered with a sombre atmosphere. ‘I never thought I’d see the day when your father turned his back on all of us.’ Vicky had suffered sleepless nights since Barney’s departure from their lives.

      Ronnie was unrepentant. ‘I don’t have a father any more,’ he declared angrily and, though his heart was sore at the thought, Thomas also agreed. Too much had happened. There had been too many tears and too much soul-searching, and now it was time to call an end to it.

      ‘He’s chosen his way, and now we have to choose ours.’ Going to his mother, Tom put his arms round her shoulders and held her close. ‘We’ll look after you, Mother, me and Ronnie and our Susie.’

      Having gathered the last of her things to be laid out for packing, Susie looked up at her brother’s words. ‘That’s right,’ she said. ‘We won’t let you down, not like he’s done!’ Shutting her father out of her life was the hardest thing Susie had ever had to do, but now it was done, and though there were regrets, there could be no turning back.

      Ronnie looked on, morose and bitter. He had said all he wanted to say on the matter of Barney Davidson, and now he was concentrating on the exciting prospect of a long sea-journey, and at the end of it, a new life; a life in which there was no place for the man who had once been their beloved and respected father.

      Although their mother assured them that everything was going to be all right and that they must not worry about her, inside she was broken up. Her love for Barney had never wavered, even through the terrible times when he had humiliated her, flaunted his women and driven her to the edge of sanity.

      ‘Mr Maitland is coming for us early in the morning,’ she reminded them. ‘Make sure you pack everything you want to take. There’ll be no coming back once we’ve gone.’ The words stuck in her throat – once we’ve gone. How casual it sounded, when all the time this remarkable journey to America would be the most frightening step she would ever take, especially without her beloved Barney by her side.

      ‘I need to get a few things in town,’ she lied now. ‘I won’t be long. You all carry on with what you’re doing and we’ll go through everything when I get back.’

      Ronnie walked with her to the door. ‘It’ll be all right, you know,’ he said quietly. ‘We will manage without him.’

      Displaying a bright smile, she nodded. ‘I know, son.’

      ‘You still love him, don’t you?’

      The smile slid away and in its place came a bitter-sweet look of regret. ‘Yes, I’ll always love him,’ she answered softly. ‘And so will you … we all will.’

      Feeling her pain, he took her in his arms.

      Neither of them spoke again, and when Vicky drew away, he helped her on with her coat and opened the door for her. And when she went down the lane he stood there for what seemed an age. ‘It’s just the four of us now,’ he murmured. ‘We’ll have to take care of each other.’

      Vicky had already done all her shopping and was ready to leave Liverpool forever. But she had to make one last desperate attempt to recover the Barney she knew, and rebuild the marriage in which she had found such great joy all these years.

      With that in mind, she made her way to Bridget’s house.

      Lucy was in the sitting room talking with Barney when she heard the knock on the door. ‘I bet that’s Bridget, forgotten her keys again,’ she told him. Having taken Lucy’s advice these past few days, Barney was rested and feeling much better.

      When she opened the door, Lucy was astonished and delighted to see Vicky standing there. ‘Oh, Vicky! I’m so glad you came,’ she told her. ‘I was going to come and see you later on, to wish you well.’ She stood aside. ‘Come in. Please, come in.’

      Vicky made no move. ‘I wondered if you might be thinking of coming out to the house again.’ Her tone was unfriendly. ‘But you would not have been welcome today, any more than you were yesterday. You know how we feel about Barney staying here.’ Her expression hardened. ‘You’re the last person I would have thought to keep my husband away from us.’

      Lucy was about to reply, when Barney himself appeared. ‘Lucy has nothing to do with it,’ he told Vicky. ‘I’m staying here with a woman friend.’

      Vicky looked at him, at this stranger, unshaven and thinner than she remembered, and in his eyes there was a look she did not recognise. ‘It’s not too late,’ she told him. ‘You can still make amends.’

      Now, as Barney gazed down on her tired face, he realised the pain she had suffered, and all because of him. His head swelled with love and he wanted so much to take her in his arms and tell her that he adored her still, and that his family meant more to him than anything else in the world.

      Instead, СКАЧАТЬ