The Lion Lies Waiting Read online

  “That was some story, George,” said Hamilton Bounsell, the village butcher. “Is that…?”

  “The same,” he said, holding up the mask. “My sister couldn’t bear to see it again, so I took it away with me after my niece’s funeral and repaired it. I just wanted something to remember her by.”

  “Oh. I see.”

  “I suppose you think it ghoulish of me to trot out the tale for entertainment, but after we’re gone, what do our lives become but stories? Stories of hope, love, loss, regret. Stories others can learn from, with any luck. My poor sister...”

  “A captive of her own remorse.”

  George stroked the feathers of the mask as he returned it to the hook on the wall.

  “Guilt is the most effective prison, Mr. Bounsell, because it’s the one we build for ourselves.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  ROBIN COVERED HIS mouth with his hand. He kept looking from the tattoo, to his cap, to Vince’s face, and back again. The strange anchor had only ever been seen in connection with his father. His father, the philandering pirate. His father, the liar. His father, the hero. There were two anchors Robin knew of—the one on his father’s journal and the one sewn to his own cap, but here was a third, tattooed on the arm of the great lump before him. The criminal, the brawler, the gorilla who worked the underbelly of Blackrabbit.

  “Your father?” Robin blurted out. “This is your father’s cap?”

  “This here is his symbol. He put it on the letter he wrote to Mum.”

  “A letter,” Robin repeated. “A letter to your mum, ’ere on Blackrabbit. What do you know about ’im?”

  “He was a fisherman who came here, seduced Mum, left her pregnant with me. She never knew his name, but he always had this hat on his head.”

  “It does sound like Dad,” Robin sighed, as he sank back against the stern of the boat. “’E liked ’is women. Liked them a lot, by all accounts. ’E never mentioned you in ’is journal, though.”

  “Who is he, then?” Vince asked. The menace was gone, replaced by something sounding close to vulnerability.

  “’Is name were Captain Erasmus Shipp,” Robin said. “’E gave me that cap when I were a lad.”

  “Dead?”

  “Forty years now.”

  He thought there was a flicker of disappointment on the other man’s face.

  “Suppose that makes us brothers, then,” Vince said.

  “Well, ’alf brothers,” Robin corrected.

  Vince had put his shirt back on and was struggling with the buttons. They were tricky enough to close and Robin was sure he could see the slightest of trembles in those thick, sausage fingers. Vince soon gave up on the buttons and stuffed the shirt tails back into his trousers.

  “How’d he die? My…our…father?” Vince asked.

  “You ever ’ear tell o’ The Battle in the Bay?”

  “Two pirate ships fighting each other? Off the coast of Blashy Cove?”

  “Our dad were captain of one of ’em. The Fledglin’ Crow. ’E saved the village from bein’ sacked by a man named Oughterlauney, an old adversary of ’is. 1726, it were. Then in 1740, Oughterlauney came back for revenge. Dad went to stop ’im and drowned when Oughterlauney’s ship, The Caldera, were sunk by pirate ’unters from the Chase Tradin’ Company. I were ten years old at the time.”

  “Caldera. The boat from the song. Dad was a pirate,” Vince said, sounding out the words, as if trying to fully understand their meaning.

  “’E were an ’ero, too. Don’t forget that. ’E saved my village. Twice.”

  “Being the son of a pirate makes sense for me. Being the son of a hero is harder to accept.”

  The two men sat silently for a spell. Robin found people difficult to read at the best of times but Vince was a wall. His heavy brow shielded his small, bright eyes and his jaw flexed as he clenched his teeth. Robin guessed Vince had been born before their father had begun his affair with Morwenna Whitewater. It would make Vince only a year or two older than himself. He wondered if perhaps Vince was jealous. Had things worked out differently, might Vince have lived a life with both his father and his mother? Or perhaps even have been taken back to Blashy Cove and raised in a very different environment, away from the pitiless Port Knot? Would it have meant Robin would never have been born or would their father still have pursued the true love of his life? There was no way to ever know, of course, but Robin knew he’d spend a good deal of time thinking about it.

  “Why are you out here all alone?” Vince asked. “Got the look of a man with a decision to make.”

  Robin thought back to the argument with Edwin and winced. “I might ’ave lost the most important part of my life tonight.”

  “Big ginger fella with the shaved head?”

  Robin nodded.

  “Stuff him.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “You heard me. Stuff him. He doesn’t want you? Fine, then you don’t want him, either.”

  “It’s not so simple.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because ’e weren’t just a dalliance, ’e’s…’e’s my friend. We were close before we were…close.”

  “Huh. You two ruined that when you climbed into bed together.”

  “Ah, you don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, you don’t even know us.”

  “Seen it happen plenty of times,” Vince said. “Friends get drunk, fall into each other’s arms, and regret it the next morning. Things are never the same afterwards. So, stuff him. You’re the son of a pirate, and the son of a pirate doesn’t sit around moping. Go out, get drunk, and find someone else. It’s what I’d do.”

  As he listened to his first ever piece of brotherly advice, Robin thought again about casting off and sailing away. How easy it would be. There was a time, not so long ago, when he would have given in to the desire in a heartbeat. The sea would calm him, he was certain, but maybe what he needed wasn’t calmness. Maybe he needed the fire in his belly, the urge to fix things, the urge to fight. Vince was wrong. Whatever happened between them, Edwin still needed him. Long before they became intimate, they had a bond which had seen them both through hard times. Was he to lose that, too? No, he wasn’t prepared to lose everything in one night. He became determined to show Edwin the kind of man he truly was. Even if he was no longer wanted in his bed, he would always stand by Edwin’s side.

  IT WAS THE morning of the winter solstice and Robin woke to the sounds of dockhands shouting and gulls cawing. After Vince had left, he’d decided it was best not to return to the inn and so had spent a more or less restless night on board Bucca’s Call. After a discrete pee over the edge of the boat and into the morning tide, he stirred himself to life and clambered onto the pier, fixing his navy-coloured cap on his bald head and started toward town. In a clearing by the docks, huge amounts of wood and cloth were being stacked in a roughly circular shape. It looked to Robin like the beginnings of a mighty bonfire.

  He refreshed himself in his room at the Lion Lies Waiting and realised the bed hadn’t been slept in. He filled a bottle with fresh water and made enquiries downstairs.

  “Your Mr. Farriner made quite a night of it,” Mrs. Firebrace said. “Drinking and dancing until all hours. You’ll have to cover the cost of the broken glasses.

  “Of course,” said Robin.

  “And the tables.”

  “I was glad when it finally spilled outside,” said the haughty dash who served them on their first night. He’d been sweeping the floor of the bar and jutted into the conversation.

  “Outside?” Robin asked.

  “Someone dared your really-quite-remarkably drunk friend to climb the clock tower.”

  “Who would do that?”

  “Me,” said the dash. “It was late and I wanted rid of them. Once they’re out the door, they’re somebody else’s problem.”

  Robin glowered at the young man.

  “He took the whole rowdy lot with him. A few of them tried to talk him out of it, but mostly they just
egged him on.”

  “Disgraceful behaviour,” said Mrs. Firebrace with a sniff.

  “It’s about what I expect from your lot,” the dash said to Robin, earning him a slap round the ear from Mrs. Firebrace.

  “Back to your sweeping, boy,” she said.

  She picked up her pug and lovingly stroked under his chin. Robin shook his head and made for the exit.

  “You are welcome to return at any time,” Mrs. Firebrace called after him, “but I’m afraid the baker Farriner is not. It seems I am destined to banish the entire Farriner clan!”

  Robin walked outside and made for the clock tower in the town square. At the base of it, he stooped down to pick up one boot and a pair of fawn coloured corduroy trousers. He sighed and looked upward. Sure enough, there was Edwin, tucked into an archway, lying in just his top-shirt, with one arm hanging over the edge of the masonry. Despite his fear of heights, Edwin was well known for climbing when he was inebriated. It looked to Robin like he’d pulled off his boots to throw at the crowd, possibly followed by other items of clothing.

  He walked to the rear of the clock tower and located the door. It was locked, but one forceful shove of his shoulder made short work of it. He climbed the icy cold stone staircase until he reached the low ceilinged room where Edwin had passed out. Setting the clothing on the floor, he sat on the ledge, letting his long legs hang out over the side. He could faintly hear the sound of the prison bells, their ringing travelling far in the still December air. He swung his legs in time to their chiming.

  “Mornin’, Mr. Farriner,” he said, taking a swig from the water bottle.

  Edwin blinked his eyes open and sat up, instinctively leaning into the room. A fall from that height would probably not be fatal, but neither would it be pleasant. Robin handed him the water bottle. Edwin sat there for a moment, grateful for the water on his parched palate, then he pointed to his trousers and boot by the door.

  “That’ll be why my bum is cold,” he said in a raspy, dry voice.

  Robin chuckled a little, taking in the architecture around him.

  “We could do with one o’ these back ’ome,” he said. “Feeling better?”

  “Yes. I mean, no, I feel like death, but…yes.”

  He took another mouthful of water, then leaned his head against the stonework and closed his eyes. “Drink made me say those things, Robin. I didn’t mean them.”

  “Oh, that’s not strictly true,” Robin replied, with a mockingly jovial tone he didn’t even know he was capable of. “Drink don’t change who you are but it can give you the courage to voice what you’ve been ’oldin’ back. I just didn’t realise you needed it to really talk to me. You’re the nicest, kindest man I know—everyone says it about you—and I know secretly you pride yourself on the reputation. It’s taken you a long time to earn it back ’ome, given the way you used to be, but I do wonder if sometimes you’re so focused on keepin’ the reputation up, you let certain things slide you ought not to. I wonder if it makes you afraid to say what’s botherin’ you.”

  Edwin opened his bloodshot eyes. “It’s just…I’ve been on my own for so long and I’ve always...”

  “Always what?”

  Edwin sighed. “I’ve always been afraid that version of me, the one who comes out when I drink too much, the version I was for so long, that he was the real me. Underneath all along, just waiting to come back. I’ve been worried this version—the one who’s been your friend, your lover, the version who can run a bakery and have an apprentice—that he’s just a fraud. A pretence.”

  “Edwin. You’re no fraud. It truly were you doin’ all them things. You rose to the challenge, you saved your family from ruin, you saved yourself. I…I really tried not to repeat the same mistakes. I tried to give you my time, tried to be open an’ ’onest. I just wish you’d been able to do the same. To talk to me, properly talk to me. You know Duncan and I parted ways because we didn’t talk properly. I didn’t want the same to ’appen to us.”

  A number of people passing by the clock tower stopped to stare up at Robin’s dangling legs. He smiled and waved to them. An involuntary response.

  “I feel responsible for what’s happened with Mum,” Edwin said. “For not seeing what was going on.”

  “You can’t blame yourself for ’er. My mum grew up with ’er, remember? She’s told me stories about when they were young. Your mum’s always been this way. She’s always ’ad this animal. The real tragedy is we’ll never know what kind of person she would ’ave been without it.”

  Edwin lay his head against the wall and was silent, deep in thought.

  “I know I’m not the brightest light at sea, but if I ’ad to guess, I’d say you were deliberately tryin’ to push me away. But I couldn’t guess as to why.”

  Edwin’s voice cracked as he spoke. “I’ve been selfish, Robin. I’ve been so worried if I let myself fall for you—really, properly fall for you—and it didn’t work out between us I’d end up going back to what I was before. I thought I’d end up letting you down, letting Dad down, losing the business, losing everything. I don’t know how else to put this, but…I’m scared, Robin. I’m scared the illness affecting Mum is inside me too, and I’m scared it’s going to beat me. I’m scared I’m not strong enough to hold it back forever, that it’s going to twist my mind and turn me into the kind of hateful person she is. I’m scared I’m going to end up hurting you, end up…ruining you. And most of all, I’m scared you’re too kind-hearted a person to leave me before I do. I’m scared even thinking about this is hurting you, hurting us. I’m terrified, in fact. It’s like there’s this huge storm on the horizon, and there’s nowhere I can run. All I could think to do is push you out of the way so you don’t get caught in it. And it’s what I tried to do last night. I did it to make it easier for me, to stop myself from getting too hurt.”

  “Did it work?”

  “No. No, it didn’t,” Edwin said, visibly trying to stop himself from crying, his voice reduced to a whisper. “What if the animal gets the better of me too, Robin?”

  “You don’t ’ave to be strong enough to fight it on your own, not anymore. You’ve got your friends. You’ve got me.”

  Robin laid a hand on one of Edwin’s cold, bare feet, giving it a friendly squeeze.

  “I came ’ere with a whole speech prepared about ’ow no matter what ’appens between us, I’d always be ’ere if you needed me, but I can’t remember it now.”

  “I was feeling…vulnerable…and I took it out on you. I was trying to prove to myself, to everyone, that I didn’t need anyone, that I could do it alone, fix everything by myself.”

  “But you don’t ’ave to do it alone, not anymore. That’s what I’m tryin’ to make you understand. You ’ave me.” Robin sighed. “I should ’ave seen you were sufferin’, but I’ve never been very observant.”

  “It’s not your fault, I should have been more honest about what I was going through. My own damn pride wouldn’t let me.”

  Robin swung his legs again, kicking the stonework with his heels.

  “What I said last night was wrong,” Edwin said, his voice barely a whisper. “I’ll always need you, Robin. And not just as a friend. I know there’s nothing romantic between you and Duncan. Of course I know, I was there when you struggled to get over him, I watched you suffer through it.”

  “I spent plenty o’ time cryin’ on your shoulder over ’im.”

  “I broke it, didn’t I?” Edwin said. “I broke us.”

  Robin tipped his cap back and smiled, his heart lifting.

  “You didn’t break anythin’. You’ve ’ad a terrible shock, what with findin’ out about your mum and Ambrose and everythin’. You ’ad a wobble. It’s allowed.”

  “Ah, I’m sorry, Robin,” Edwin said shaking his head.

  “Don’t be,” Robin said, squeezing the bare foot again. “I understand.”

  “You really do, don’t you?” Edwin said.

  In the light of a slow winter sky, Robin felt like he was
seeing Edwin for the first time.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  EVA SAT BY her father’s bedside in the medical wing of Chase Manor. The specially constructed bed, with its ability to be raised and lowered simply by the turning of a wheel, looked much too large for him. He was awash in a tide of pristine white sheets and dashed against a bluff of pillows. Various tubes and valves and bellows puffed and hissed and sang all around him. The latest in medical know-how condensed into an apparatus perched on the headboard like a copper vulture, its talons holdings firm for dear life, its beak dipping down, looping, twirling and ending in an object that looked for all the world like an ear trumpet which every now and then a nurse would swing to her father’s face and encourage him to inhale from. She couldn’t hope to understand what it all did, but it was keeping her father alive. For the time being.

  Her father was in a daze and didn’t register her presence at all. In the spacious room that would have looked more at home in a hospital, a small team of doctors and nurses busied themselves with charts and books, scrambling for the next scrap of information which might enable them to prolong the life of their employer. Eva couldn’t help but wonder how many other, less affluent people were suffering from their lack of attention, wondered if perhaps their knowledge and skill might be put to better use. Then she realised what she was essentially thinking was these people must have had better things to do than make an old man more comfortable in his final hours, and surprising herself, she was pricked by a barb of guilt.

  “He’s not merely ill, then,” Iris said.

  Eva hadn’t heard her enter. She moved with such softness and grace she made hardly any sound on the deep, expensive carpets of the manor. Back home, she was so bubbly and bright she immediately lit up any room she entered but the manor was dulling the light within her, as though the house itself was draining the life from her. Eva suddenly found she couldn’t wait to leave and guilt once more nicked her, making her stomach swirl.