The weight of despair in his voice checked her condemnation. He too was suffering, and he coped less well than the child.
Last night, the word ‘deaf’ had made a change come over him and she’d judged him severely, assuming that he’d reacted with repulsion, as so many people did. But the truth was that deafness confronted him with problems he couldn’t cope with, and a miserable awareness of his own failure.
‘What should I do?’ he said wearily. ‘For God’s sake, tell me if you know!’
‘I can tell you what it’s like for Joey,’ she said. ‘If you understood that, you might find things easier for both of you.’ She saw Joey looking at them and said, ‘Not now,’ quietly to Carson.
For the rest of the meal she concentrated on the child, making him feel included. Carson ate very little, but he watched them, his eyes moving from one to the other as though he was afraid to miss anything.
‘May I use your telephone?’ Gina asked after a while. She’d remembered that Dan was due to call her.
‘There’s one in that room through there,’ Carson said.
She called Dan’s mobile and found him slightly tetchy.
‘You didn’t say you were going to be out tonight,’ he complained.
‘I didn’t know. Something came up suddenly.’
‘My boss invited me to his house and said to bring you, too. It didn’t look good when I turned up without you.’
‘I’m sorry, but I didn’t know.’
‘You’ve still got time to get here if you hurry.’
‘All right, I’ll try to-’
Then she saw Joey watching her from the doorway.
His face told her that he understood. He couldn’t hear the words, but when you were deaf you always knew when people were preparing to desert you.
Desert? Nonsense! She didn’t owe Joey anything.
But she did. Because he was trapped in the dreadful silent world from which she had escaped. And the deaf always owed each other, because they knew terrible secrets that nobody else knew.
‘I’m sorry, I can’t,’ she said hurriedly.
‘Gina, this is important.’
‘And my job is important to me,’ she said, seizing an excuse that Dan would understand. ‘I blotted my copy- book with a client this afternoon, and I’m trying to put it right.’ Hurriedly she explained about the accident, and about Joey. She could sense Dan becoming interested.
‘Carson Page? The man you were talking to last night?’
‘Yes.’
‘You’re at his home?’
‘Yes.’
‘That posh place in Belmere Avenue?’
‘Yes.’
‘Hmm. All right. I’ll be in touch.’
He hung up.
Carson had come to the door to urge Joey back to the table. It was clear he’d heard part of the conversation. He looked at her wryly.
‘Did I force you to break a date?’ he asked.
‘No, there’s no problem.’ She spoke to Joey. ‘I’m not going yet.’
His brilliant smile was her reward.
After the meal Joey, at a nod from his father, switched on the television to watch his favourite soap, with the aid of subtitles. The two of them cleared the plates into the kitchen. Carson poured her a glass of wine, and pulled out a chair at the table.
‘I haven’t told you properly how grateful I am,’ he said. ‘I should never have taken Joey to that place, but I didn’t know what else to do. He broke up from school today and, without Mrs Saunders, I had to take him with me. I got absorbed in business and didn’t see him wander off. But for you, I might have lost him.’ He added quietly. ‘And I couldn’t bear that. He’s all I have.’
‘I wish you’d asked me to look after him at the office this afternoon,’ Gina said.
‘I thought of it, but I didn’t know how, without breaking my word and admitting that we’d met before.’
‘You should have broken it,’ she said at once.
‘Also, I wasn’t sure if your employers knew about you. I didn’t want to let the cat out of the bag, precisely because there are people like Philip Hale in the world.’
‘I thought you were like him,’ she admitted. ‘Last night-’
‘I didn’t react very well, I know. But it’s like floundering in a sea of confusion. I try to remind myself that it’s worse for Joey.’
‘Yes, poor little soul. Outsiders can’t imagine-the sheer frustration when the words are building up inside you and you can’t get them out-and people look at you as if you’re crazy-’
‘If that’s meant for me, don’t bother. We’ve already agreed that I’m a hopeless father with no idea what his son needs.’
‘Surely you know one thing that he needs? His mother. Even if you and she have fallen out, she’s the person with the best chance of understanding him. If he had her, he wouldn’t have to indulge in fairy tales about film stars.’
‘What makes you think he’s indulging in fairy tales?’ Carson asked wryly.
‘Oh, please! I’ve seen Angelica Duvaine’s picture by his bed. She looks about twenty.’
‘She’d be thrilled to hear you say so. She’s twenty-eight. That picture’s been cleverly touched up. Mind you, even the reality looks much younger than the fact. She’s worked on her appearance-diet, massage, exercise. The next thing was going to be plastic surgery to lift her breasts. It was the row over that that made her finally move out. Not that she was here much anyway, by that time.’
‘Are you telling me that Angelica Duvaine really is Joey’s mother?’ Gina asked, only half believing.
‘In a sense. Her real name is Brenda Page but it’s years since she answered to it. When our divorce is finalised in a few weeks she won’t even be that any more.
‘I know I look like the monster separating mother and child, but I wouldn’t be doing it if she showed any interest in him. You should read some of Brenda’s press interviews. She’s never once told the world she has a son. From the moment she realised Joey had a problem with his hearing, he ceased to exist as far as she was concerned. He was a blot, something to be ashamed of. My wife, you see, values physical perfection above everything.’
He waited a moment, to see if she had any answer for this.
‘Oh, dear God!’ Gina whispered at last. ‘That poor little boy.’
‘Joey adores her. God knows why, when she treats him so carelessly. She goes away, ignores him, comes back for five minutes, then goes away and breaks his heart again. But he never holds it against her, no matter how badly she behaves.’
‘Of course not,’ Gina said. ‘He thinks it’s his fault.’
He looked at her strangely. ‘Is that how it was for you?’
‘Something like that. I was lucky in my mother-she was wonderful, but she died. My father-well, I think he actually found me repellent. And I knew I must have done something terrible to make him not love me.’
‘And that’s what Joey thinks?’
‘He told me that his mother loves him. He probably explains her absences by blaming himself. But I’m only guessing.’
‘So what do I do?’ Carson demanded. ‘Explain to him that his mother is a selfish woman who loves nobody but herself? That she remembers him when it suits her and abandons him when it suits her? Why do you think I’m trying to separate them finally? Because I can’t stand the look on his face when she leaves again-as she always does.’
‘But she’s his mother-she must love him, in her own way-’
‘Then why didn’t she take him with her? I wouldn’t have tried to stop her, if she’d really wanted him. Don’t judge every mother by your own. They’re not all wonderful.’
