CHAPTER 5

      ‘Another corned beef sandwich?’

      Uncle Bert’s elderly next-door neighbour advanced across the carpet with a mountainous plate in her hands. ‘Plenty more in the fridge, Mr May. Another three plates at least.’ Mrs Wardle looked sadly about her. ‘I didn’t know how many people to make them for, you see.’

      Frank May, latterly headmaster of the Harold Vincent Comprehensive School, Middlesex, waved away the plate in a lordly manner. He also declined a chocolate finger and a lemon-flavoured cup-cake.

      ‘I suppose Bert didn’t keep any beer?’ he asked, getting up on a sudden hope. Tall, solidly built, and with a shiny pink dome of a head, he dominated the dingy front room of his brother’s terraced house. And, looking at him, it was difficult for Susannah to believe that her father lived permanently in the Dordogne. No amount of time in the sun seemed to turn his English ruddiness to a decent tan.

      ‘Beer?’ Mrs Wardle’s hat quivered as she looked round at her laden trays. She had made quantities of tea in large brown earthenware pots. ‘Well, I can’t say I would know about beer,’ she said stiffly, ‘but I’ll go and have a look in the scullery.’

      Susannah felt obliged to help herself to another sandwich since there were so many about to go to waste, but her stomach protested after the first bite. She doubted whether she could manage to force down any more of the margarined monstrosities.

      ‘Family all right?’ Frank asked. They hadn’t had much chance to talk at the funeral.

      ‘Oh, we’re all very well, I’m glad to say.’ Susannah put down a thick crust. ‘Katy’s having a whale of a time in a flat with some friends – not far from here, as a matter of fact. I might look in on her later if I have time.

      ‘And Simon’s still doing well at the estate agent’s in Bristol. He and Natalie are getting on fine, though of course we’d still love them to get married. Justin is adorable – it’s hard to believe he’s ten months old already. As for Paul – well, he was going to come with me today but he found he had a meeting …’

      Her voice trailed away and she looked down at her uncomfortably high black shoes. She didn’t like having to tell a white lie about Paul, and now she was going to have to ask after her wretched step-mother.

      ‘And Jan?’ she forced out. ‘She decided not to come with you?’

      ‘She’s – er – fine, thank you. Fine. But Bert was nothing to her, really – she only met him once or twice – so there didn’t seem much point in her coming all this way.’

      ‘You surprise me. It’s not like Jan to miss an opportunity to go round the London stores.’

      ‘Oh, how lovely to live abroad!’ Mrs Wardle broke in. She had come back into the room empty-handed, having apparently forgotten why she’d left it. ‘I think it’s a wonderful idea. All that sea, sun and fresh air.’

      ‘We’re miles from the sea,’ Frank said abruptly, and he turned to look round the room in a dismissive manner that made Susannah feel even more awkward than she had before.

      Mrs Wardle, it was true, was not the kind of woman her father would suffer gladly. She was niceness personified: one of those people who smile constantly and too closely into your face and can’t do enough to please you. No, definitely not his type; but that didn’t excuse his behaviour.

      ‘Er –’ Susannah thought quickly – ‘it was really very good of you to organise the funeral and everything, Mrs Wardle. I hope it wasn’t too much trouble.’

      ‘Only too happy to do it, my dear. Not that there was much to be done. Bert had arranged everything years ago with the Co-op, you see. So very thoughtful of him, wasn’t it? But that was his way. Just like the vicar said.’

      ‘Yes …’ Susannah frowned as she recalled the brief eulogy. Words had streamed easily enough from the vicar’s lips, but what they had boiled down to was that Bert had been a nobody who had made no mark on the world – a fact that Susannah found profoundly disturbing in her current frame of mind. She had yet to make a mark of her own.

      Frank coughed noisily, anxious to draw things to a close.

      ‘Well –’ he barked a laugh with no trace of humour in it – ‘can’t hang around here all day eating and drinking, can we? We – er – ahem – ought to get down to business.’

      Susannah and Mrs Wardle looked blank.

      ‘The will, of course, the will,’ he was finally compelled to explain. ‘Now I know the poor old s—I mean poor old Bert’s only just been seen on his way, so to speak, but none of us has the time for life’s little niceties, do we? I’ve got a flight to catch, and Susannah’s got a train, so … well, where have you put it, Mrs Wardle?’

      ‘Put what?’ The woman flushed to find attention suddenly upon her.

      ‘The will.’ Frank visibly seethed. ‘My brother Albert’s will. He must have left one with you.’

      But no amount of prompting could make Mrs Wardle recall a will. Or a solicitor. Or anything relevant. So Frank allocated them each a room and told them they must search it. Thoroughly.

      ‘Da-ad! You can’t!’ Susannah hissed, tugging at his sleeve.

      ‘What? Why not? What else d’you expect me to do?’

      She jerked her head in the direction of Mrs Wardle. ‘It can wait, I’m sure,’ she declared loudly, and her father went off in a huff. She didn’t know what on earth he was doing upstairs; all she knew was that she was left to clear up the tea things.

      Eventually she went to watch him turning out boxes and tipping drawers on to her uncle’s bed.

      Bert had apparently collected silver paper and brown paper bags; bus tickets and bottle tops; string, candles and match books; books on fishing and fell-walking, and birds, and railways and trees.

      ‘Dad, this is really awful of you …’

      Frank caught her expression and had the decency to show a little shame – if a slight deepening of his skin could be attributed to that emotion.

      ‘I don’t like having to do this, Susie, any more than