The Getaway Girls: A hilarious feel-good summer read Page 8

  They had enough supplies to get them through the day, and the lovely Étienne had offered to sell them some milk and fresh bread, if necessary. As she looked out of the window she saw the two German girls dismantling their tent. Now they might have this little field all to themselves.

  Connie enjoyed being on the move, even here in France where she found driving much more stressful than at home. For forty-one years she’d mostly stayed still, bringing up the family and running a small floristry business. There had been, of course, the Annual Holiday. This event frequently involved driving both in Europe and further afield, and always involved worries about the kids – Where had Nick got to? (Surely he’d been standing right here just a minute ago?) And Diana with the runs after those dodgy moules! Then there was Ben befriending every dog that ambled in their direction, with the accompanying fear of his being bitten and infected with rabies. And what about little Lou, who refused to eat ‘funny food’ and was averse to sleeping at night? And not least there was Roger, her then husband, deciding where and when they were going and shouting at everyone to get a move on.

  It wasn’t until she’d taken off alone three years ago in Kermit, her little green Ford Escort, that she realised how enjoyable it was to be travelling with no family responsibilities, no schedule or timetable, and the added plus of making new, and often unlikely, friends.

  This trip was, of course, different. She wasn’t alone for a start, but she was in a position to decide where to go and when, because after all Bella was hers and she was in the driving seat, proverbially at least. And she certainly hadn’t asked these two to come along. She was beginning to realise that the aim of this trip was not so much to find family in Italy as it was about the getting there. And presumably the getting back, although she couldn’t begin to contemplate that far ahead yet.

  She could hear no movement from the other two, only some gentle snores from Gill, which Maggie had presumably become accustomed to, much to Connie’s relief. She did not relish the idea of sharing her precious bedsit area.

  She filled the kettle and placed it on the stove to boil before ambling out in her nightie to survey their surroundings. It was another beautiful morning, already very warm, the air scented (could that be wine?), and a dog barking somewhere in the distance. They’d set up the table, chairs and awning on arrival the previous evening and Connie sat, for the first time, in one of the canvas chairs. It was surprisingly comfortable. I want to stay here for a bit, she thought, stretch out in the sun and do absolutely nothing.

  She made a cup of tea and returned to sit outside, joined after a few minutes by Maggie, with Alka-Seltzers fizzing furiously in a glass.

  ‘No more alcohol,’ she muttered, ‘ever.’

  ‘Can’t wait to see how soon you change your mind.’ Connie smiled.

  Maggie sank into one of the chairs. ‘And why is there always powder left undissolved in the bottom of the glass?’

  ‘Don’t know. Probably the same reason there’s always a teaspoon left in the washing-up basin and a sock missing from the washing machine.’

  Maggie leaned closer. ‘I’ll tell you something interesting now,’ she whispered. ‘Gill has false teeth!’

  Connie laughed. ‘No!’

  ‘Oh yes, she does. I suspected as much because she keeps a covered mug by her bunk at night and she never wants to talk after she’s got into bed.’

  ‘Well, that doesn’t mean—’

  ‘Yes, it does. This morning I had a quick peep in the mug while she was snoring away, and there was her set of gnashers smiling up at me.’

  ‘Poor old Gill. I sometimes wonder how much of her is real,’ Connie said.

  ‘That reminds me of a joke.’

  ‘Go on, then.’

  ‘There’s this newly married couple on their wedding night. First, the bride removes her wig, then she takes out her teeth, discards her falsies and unscrews an artificial leg. Then she says, “I’m ready, darling.” He says, “Well, chuck it over. You know the bit I want.”’

  Connie laughed. ‘When I was young nearly all the grown-ups had false teeth. They’d get to forty or fifty and get the lot taken out. It seemed to be the thing to do.’

  ‘And then have a nice, frizzy perm.’

  ‘And squeeze into their corsets,’ added Connie.

  ‘With suspenders dangling.’

  They sat quietly sipping their tea before Connie said, ‘I’d like to stay here today. As the kids would say, it’s time to chill out.’

  ‘I’ll need to dig out the suntan lotion,’ said Maggie. ‘And my cover-up swimsuit.’

  ‘What on earth are you covering up? There’s nothing of you.’

  ‘Since we’re talking of imperfections I might as well admit to mine.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘I had my left breast removed ten years ago.’

  ‘Oh, Maggie, I’m so sorry. I’d no idea.’ Connie tried not to look at Maggie’s slim frontage in her cotton nightie.

  ‘That’s because I wear a bra with a falsie in the left side. Correction: I used to wear a falsie on the left side. Now I fill it up with a roll of banknotes and you’d be amazed how much I can squeeze in there.’

  Connie wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry, but then realised Maggie was laughing. She felt an enormous rush of affection for Maggie, and Maggie must be fond of her too, to have confided this secret.

  * * *

  Gill, predictably, emerged in a bikini, her enormous top half precariously contained by the pink cotton, the lower half stretched tight across her generous hips. She topped this outfit with an enormous white sunhat.

  ‘My hair’s in a bit of a mess,’ she sighed.

  The other two, spread-eagled on towels in their modest one-pieces, regarded her with awe, as she doused herself in suntan oil. She appeared to be fully made up under the wide brim of the hat.

  ‘You should never put your face in the sun,’ she advised, looking at them with disapproval, ‘if you want to avoid wrinkles.’ With that she flopped down, none too gracefully, on her beach towel.

  ‘So, where did these Italian relatives spring from, Connie?’ Maggie asked, as she smoothed Ambre Solaire on her legs.

  ‘The fact is I honestly don’t even know if I’ve got any,’ Connie replied. ‘It’s only that when my aunt died I discovered a box from her attic full of stuff about my dad’s side of the family, which I knew nothing about, and I discovered my grandmother – my father’s mother, that is – was Italian.’

  ‘Surely you knew that before?’ Gill said.

  ‘No, I didn’t. I was only five, you see, when my parents were killed in an accident. And my grandparents died around the time I was born.’

  ‘Oh, Connie!’ Maggie stretched across and patted Connie’s shoulder. ‘Oh, poor you! To lose both your parents at five! However did you cope?’

  ‘Well, my mother’s brother took me in to live with his brood of four. I’m none too sure my aunt was very pleased with the arrangement, particularly as Uncle Bill spent most of his time in the oil business in Nigeria, and so she had to cope with us all single-handed for most of the year.’

  Connie well remembered being at the bottom of the pecking order; well fed, well clothed but often a little lacking in love and attention. How she’d looked forward to Uncle Bill’s visits home!

  ‘So what have you found out about the Italian grandmother?’ Gill asked.

  ‘Only that she was called Maria Martilucci and she came from somewhere near Amalfi. That,’ she added for Gill’s benefit, ‘is just south of Naples. So I did some googling.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And there are Martiluccis scattered around the country who may, or may not, be related.’

  ‘How interesting!’ Maggie said. ‘I think that’s so exciting. And you’re due some nice relatives, Connie, aren’t you? After losing your parents like that when you were just a wee girl! And you’ve just got divorced, haven’t you?’

  ‘Well, yes, but I can’t really complain about my life. And
I have my lovely kids.’ Connie decided not to mention her beloved son, Ben. I’ll tell them later when we know each other better, she thought.

  ‘Five years old!’ Maggie repeated. ‘You poor wee girl!’

  ‘What about you, Maggie? Don’t you miss your son, him being so far away in Australia?’ Connie asked.

  ‘Oh yes, I do. We Skype regularly, but it’s not the same.’

  ‘And you wouldn’t consider flying out there?’

  ‘I’ve flown around Europe, but for the whole time my heart is pounding and my knuckles are white with clutching the armrests. No way could I do twenty-odd hours. No way.’

  ‘Sometimes I wish one of mine would emigrate somewhere.’ Gill sounded wistful. ‘I’d love an excuse to go to America or Australia or somewhere. None of yours are abroad, are they, Connie?’

  ‘No, they’re all in England,’ Connie replied. ‘And I’m not sure I could bear it if any of them decided to emigrate. Then again, I suppose the hardest thing about being a parent has always been letting them go.’ She thought of her son Ben again. She missed him so much.

  She was lucky, she supposed, living close to Di in London, and with Nick and Lou and their families only a train ride away in Sussex, close to where she herself had lived for all of her married life. Connie recalled the endless babysitting, the taking to school and the fetching from school, because Nick’s wife worked and Lou had never been much good at coping with anything.

  But she’d had no idea how much she’d miss them. She visited often, but the little ones, though delighted to see her, had new friends and new babysitters now.

  Grandma had moved to London, and life had adapted and moved on in Sussex.

  * * *

  The sunshine was making them drowsy and before long Gill was snoring and Maggie was sighing deeply with her eyes shut. Connie decided she’d had enough sun and stood up, looked around, and decided to go to explore the little orchard and enjoy the shade of the trees. Somewhere in the distance she could hear the sound of water gushing. It wasn’t likely to be a waterfall in an area like this, but it was worth exploring. As she turned a corner between the lines of trees, she found her host, stripped to the waist, brandishing a hose.

  ‘Étienne!’ Connie exclaimed.

  ‘’Allo! As you can see it is necessary to water. These are young trees, you see.’

  All at once Connie felt sweaty, frumpy and lumpy in her demure Marks & Spencer black one-piece, and she was about to turn round, wave and walk away when he said, ‘If you and your friends would like a cold shower, this is your opportunity.’

  The thought of saving some of Bella’s water supply and the soothing cold water on her sweaty body was too much to refuse. Squealing, laughing and feeling about twelve years old, Connie danced under the jets of icy water.

  * * *

  Maggie wasn’t asleep. As soon as Connie had disappeared into the trees, she switched her phone on again and checked for messages. The man came and I tell him you not here, you never here. He driving Lexus, colour of wine, Raoul had texted. Oh God, how did he know to go there? There are loads of sites round Paris. But I’m not going to let this get to me, she thought. I’m having such a lovely time.

  Gill woke up and waited until Maggie laid down her phone. She cleared her throat. ‘What about this “lover” of yours then, Maggie?’

  Maggie sat bolt upright. ‘What?’

  ‘This lover of yours who just might come looking for you, the one you told Raoul about.’

  Maggie took a deep breath. ‘Oh,’ she said after a minute, ‘just some guy I used to know.’

  ‘Why would he be looking for you?’ Gill persisted.

  ‘Well, it’s a long story. Very boring.’

  ‘It’s Ringer, isn’t it?’

  ‘Whatever gave you that idea?’

  ‘I’m not stupid. I can put two and two together.’

  Maggie snorted. ‘Making five as usual. Wrong as usual.’

  ‘So, where did that money come from, Mags?’

  ‘I told you. From a scratch-card.’

  ‘And I think you’re telling porkies. Swear on the life of your son that you won every penny of that money on a scratch-card.’

  Maggie sighed. ‘Well, not exactly.’

  ‘Not exactly? How exactly would that be?’

  ‘Well, I know you’ll find this hard to believe, but I found it in the oven just as I was leaving.’

  ‘In the oven?’ Gill stared at her open-mouthed. ‘How on earth do you manage to cook up cash? You must let me have the recipe because it sure as hell isn’t one of Delia’s.’

  ‘I think Ringer thought it was a good place to store it overnight.’

  ‘My God, Maggie! And where might Ringer have got it from?’

  ‘A bank, I should think.’

  ‘Do you mean that he stole it?’

  ‘Well, yes. He didn’t exactly tap it out from an ATM, Gill.’

  It took a moment for Gill to fully absorb this information before she said, ‘I don’t expect he’ll be well pleased?’

  ‘No,’ Maggie replied. ‘He’s not.’

  ‘Is he likely to come after you then?’

  ‘Yes,’ Maggie replied bluntly. ‘He’s already on our tail.’ She checked her phone again. ‘But for God’s sake, don’t say anything to Connie.’

  ‘Bloody hell!’ exclaimed Gill, as Connie, dripping wet and laughing, appeared from the orchard.

  Nine

  CUTTING REMARKS

  They stocked up with water at Étienne’s where, before their departure, Lisanne appeared with a homemade apple cake and a bottle of fizzy Blanc de Blancs. ‘You are such brave ladies,’ she said. ‘I must tell Maman about you; she not ever hardly leave the kitchen.’

  Wise woman, Connie thought, looking at the other two squabbling about who was sitting up front and who wasn’t.

  On the way, they found a small supermarket where they bought some wonderful-smelling bread and a cooked chicken, along with some big, juicy peaches. And where they also filled up with fuel and visited the loo.

  ‘You make yourself go now,’ Connie ordered. ‘Otherwise you’ll be looking for a field somewhere, because we’re not carrying that around in the tank with us.’ More squabbling followed about not being able to do such things to order. ‘People get heart attacks straining when they don’t really need to go,’ Gill informed her.

  They were feeling very jaded, and still a little hungover, when they spotted the layby, screened by trees, off a remote minor road somewhere just north of Lyon. The only sound was that of birdsong and a tractor in the distance. Maggie and Gill had colluded in their navigating in order to avoid the centres of large towns and cities. They were heading in a southerly direction, with occasional tantalising glimpses of the Rhône, and Connie agreed that Lyon wasn’t a priority, delightful though it undoubtedly was.

  ‘We’ll probably make Avignon tomorrow or the next day,’ Connie said, as they assembled the awning and the chairs on the grass alongside. ‘This is such a lovely spot and so private.’

  Now, as the three settled themselves in the canvas chairs, Connie noted that her freckles were rapidly reappearing, and that they all looked decidedly pink. Only Gill’s face remained chalk-white under the large brim of the sunhat, which she insisted on wearing all day.

  ‘I bet your fellow – Ringer, isn’t it? – is missing you now you’ve gone, Maggie,’ Connie said. ‘He’ll realise now how much you meant to him.’

  ‘That only happens in chick-lit,’ Maggie said, quickly recovering her composure.

  ‘Why ever did you take up with him in the first place?’ Gill asked with a wicked grin. ‘Didn’t you know he was a villain?’

  ‘No, I didn’t at first,’ Maggie replied. It had taken some months for her to realise that Ringer did not do night shifts at the local factory, and then only because the police came banging on the door. It was the first of many such visits.

  ‘So why didn’t you leave him when you found out?’ Gill persisted.

>   ‘Because I loved him,’ Maggie replied.

  ‘Just that?’

  ‘Just that, Gill. I’ve only ever loved two men in my whole life: my husband, who I lost to cancer, and Ringer, who I’m losing to the blonde bimbo. I’m very dull, very faithful, never had affairs.’

  ‘You must be feeling terribly hurt now, Maggie, if he is being unfaithful,’ Connie said.

  ‘Well, I was hurt at first, but then I began to get angry. And it’s not like me to get angry. But, you know, I’ve stuck by him for the best part of forty bloody years. I agreed to have no more kids because he didn’t want any, I’ve covered up for him, provided alibis, found places to hide his bloody cash. And, when that failed, I visited him in jail, and struggled on alone for months on end. And I never, ever – not once – asked him where he’d nicked the money from. I didn’t want to know, you see, so that when the police questioned me I could honestly say, hand on heart, that I’d no idea.’

  There was a silence.

  ‘I’m not really a bad person,’ Maggie added.

  ‘I think you’re a lovely person,’ Connie said with feeling.

  Maggie lay back in her chair and lifted her face to the sun. ‘You should get some of this on your face and hair, Gill.’

  Gill, clad in a voluminous pink sundress, patted the brim of her hat. ‘This stays on until I find a half-decent hairdresser.’

  ‘I’m sure there’ll be lots when we get to Avignon,’ said Connie.

  ‘Or I could cut it for you,’ Maggie offered. ‘I’m quite good at cutting. Honestly.’

  ‘I don’t want it cut,’ snapped Gill.

  ‘It would take years off you. Years.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Let’s have a look at it then. Just a look.’

  ‘No, it needs washing.’

  ‘We can wash it for you, can’t we, Connie?’