Page 50 of The Secrets of Dragonfly Lodge
‘This leads eventually to the reserve,’ he remarked as the boat nosed quietly between tall bulrushes and stunted trees. After a while, he switched off the engine so that the vessel could drift along.
‘Listen,’ he said to the children. ‘And keep completely still.’ And amazingly, they did, with only Jack shuffling his feet, because he never could stay motionless.
After a short period of silence came birdsong. First one bird piped up, then another answered. ‘Warblers,’ Aaron whispered. ‘I don’t know which ones, sedge warblers maybe or willow.’
They listened for a minute before he started the motor again. The boat moved slowly along the channel, which gradually opened into a wider patch of water. It sped across this, then slowed again for another narrow stretch before finally emerging onto a second great Broad.
‘Look ahead,’ Aaron said with a grin and eventually Stef recognized what he was pointing at. Hazy in the distanceat the far edge of the lake, sunlight reflected off a tumble of white-painted buildings.
‘Nancy’s cottage!’ Stef gasped, then grabbed Livy, who had stood up to see.
‘Better not go any further,’ Aaron said, indicating a sign commanding ‘No Motor Vessels’ that was rooted in the shallows. ‘We must go back, but I thought you’d like the view.’
‘Who’s Nancy?’ Jess asked Stef.
‘She’s my…’ Livy broke in. ‘Who is Gran-gran, Daddy?’
‘Your great-grandmother.’
‘Aaron’s gran,’ Stef explained to the twins, who looked curiously at Livy as they tried to work out this relationship. Stef and Pippa’s own grandparents had all died before the twins were born, so this was alien to them.
‘Is she very old?’ Jack ventured.
‘She’s about to be eighty-one,’ Aaron told him. ‘Old, but not very, very old.’
They were edging back towards the first Broad now. Stef would have loved to stop again to listen to the birds, but they only had the boat for an hour and they’d used half of that. Also, the wind had picked up and Livy was shivering despite being warmly dressed in jeans and a fleece top under her life vest. Aaron glanced at her with concern. Stef rootled in a locker and produced a blanket, which she wrapped round the little girl.
‘A gentle trip up to the far end to see what birds there are, then we’ll go back,’ Aaron said and turned the boat in a great arc.
By the time they arrived back at the jetty twenty minutes later, the three children were chatting over a pocket guidebook about birds that Stef had found next to the blanket. The grown-ups pointed out birds on the water and the children tried to identify them.
‘That was fun,’ Livy conceded as they climbed out and Stef laughed to see the relief in Aaron’s face. He was, she thought, a little too anxious with his daughter.
Other visitors were gathering at the staithe to use the boats and the atmosphere was busy. Stef spotted a tea room next to Geoffrey Stuart’s boathouse and suggested warm drinks. Soon, the five of them were seated around a bare wooden table with a view over the Broad, sipping mugs of foaming hot chocolate and sharing cellophane packets of biscuits. Livy fetched a box of colouring materials from the windowsill and the children coloured pictures of birds and chatted together.
‘How is Nancy today?’ Stef asked Aaron.
‘Improving, I’d say. She got herself upstairs to the bathroom with the carer’s help this morning. If we make it through the next few days without incident, I reckon we can stand down. I hope so. I can’t keep coming and going at this rate.’
‘I’ll help if I can. It looks as though I’ll be here for the rest of the weekend at least.’ She glanced at the twins. ‘While my sister sorts herself out.’ She explained to Aaron in a low voice what Pippa had said about leaving her husband.
‘Oh dear, I hope it sorts itself out,’ Aaron said, then sighed. ‘I have to get Livy back to London tomorrow evening. She has school on Monday.’
‘Do you think Nancy would need me overnight again?’
‘It’s possible. But it’s too much to ask of you. And you knowwhat I think…’ He rolled a biscuit crumb under his finger and cast her an unhappy look.
‘Aaron.’ She paused, then said in low tones. ‘I know what you’re trying to say. I won’t do anything that causes Nancy trouble, I promise.’
He sighed. ‘I want to believe you.’
‘What are you talking about, Daddy?’ Livy put in.
‘Just about Gran-gran. Making sure she’s all right, love,’ Aaron replied and the girl nodded and returned to her colouring. He lowered his voice to speak to Stef. ‘I am starting to worry about her generally, you know. I hate to agree with the poison pen writer, but I don’t think she should continue to live out there on her own.’
‘She’ll take some convincing of that,’ Stef remarked.
‘I know. I broached it with her this morning. Phew, did I regret it. She said was I in collusion with the letter writer and was I trying to put her in a care home?’
