Christmas at Claridge's by Karen Swan

Author:Karen Swan [Swan, Karen]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9781447245902
Publisher: Pan
Published: 2013-11-06T18:30:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Four

Clem stood by the door, the umbrella bouncing softly in her hand as raindrops trampolined on it, water rushing through the downpipe beside her and emerging in torrents at the other end. Her shoes – leather-soled – were soaked, but she hadn’t noticed. She was staring at the doorbell, summoning the strength to push it. She’d been there for nearly ten minutes already.

The door opened and Chiara reached her arm out, taking her by the hand.

‘I’ve been watching you on the CCTV. We have it for guests,’ Chiara pointed to a small camera overhead. ‘It’s OK. It’s just us tonight . . . Come in.’

Clem walked into the corridor. She had arrived at the back door, which was directly accessible from the footpath into the port. Entering through the front meant walking along the road itself, a bad idea in these conditions.

She tried, unsuccessfully, to collapse the umbrella, but Chiara took it from her in quiet understanding.

‘You are OK?’ she asked, looping her arm through Clem’s.

Clem looked down at her and nodded as Chiara led them down the back staircase, towards the kitchen.

‘Rafa has Luca tonight. I thought we should talk, just the two of us. I have made Braciole alla Livornese. I remember it was your favourite, no?’

Clem hadn’t eaten it since her last visit here, but she nodded again and tried to smile.

They stepped into the kitchen and she shivered. Nothing had changed. The place looked exactly the same as it did ten years ago – the cream walls, terracotta floor, glazed orange crockery on open shelves, thin lace blinds, all locally made, hanging at the windows. Even the back-door key, she saw, still hung from the same hook.

‘Drink this,’ Chiara said, pouring a glass of Soave and handing it to her.

‘Sorry sorry,’ Clem mumbled. ‘I’ll be fine in a minute.’

‘Is OK. It was always going to be hard.’

Clem necked the drink, wincing as it burned her throat, and held out the glass for another. Chiara refilled it for her, then went over to a pot on the range and began stirring, looking back at her carefully, assessing her.

‘Does anyone know?’ she asked quietly.

Clem shook her head vehemently. ‘No one. I never told a soul.’ She swallowed hard. ‘You?’

‘No.’ They lapsed into their own thoughts, how both their lives had been irrevocably changed by the secret they had kept.

‘The letters . . .’

‘They kept me going.’ Clem looked at her gratefully. ‘You don’t know what they meant to me.’ Clem took another sip of wine, the edge beginning to round off her now. ‘I was so sorry to hear about your mother. I know how close you were. She was an incredible woman.’

Chiara sighed heavily, looking back into the simmering pot. ‘It is very difficult still. I miss her every day. Little things, you know? Maybe a nice comment from a guest in the book that would make her proud, or . . . or Luca coming first in his spelling test.’

‘He must miss her, too.’

Chiara nodded. ‘Yes.

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