Page 113 of The Secret House of Honey and Hope

The words rush out of me like a torrent leaving me breathless and coughing. I stop and have to brace a hand on the trunk of a tree to catch my breath and calm down. To fight back the tears. It’s a minute before I turn back to find Hal waiting for me.

“It’s very sad, I know, my love,” he says in the tenderest voice. It’s the first time he’s used the L word. I mean I’ve sort of known; it’s been understood but we haven’t said it to each other. And now it seems wasted because we’re in the middle of an argument.

As if to prove my point, Hal says, “But you cannot protect him from age. It’s a fact of life, it comes to everyone.”

His words cut me. “Just a fact of life? That’s so glib. You hated me when I—”

“I never hated you.” He interrupts.

“—When I said crazy whispers. Now you’re saying…” My foot catches on something, a broken branch or something, and I stumble.

Hal shoots out an arm and catches me. “Slow down.” He says gently as he kicks away a broken branch. “It’s hard to see with all the leaves and grass but there are rocks and potholes and all sorts. Here, stop for a minute.”

His hands are still on both my arms, and he’s standing very close.

“Hal.” I look up at him; his face is ghostly in the moonlight defusing through the trees. “If I thought he really has lost his mind, I’d agree with you. But you don’t know him. You only saw him once over dinner. He was tired, and he’s never at his best in the evening. So, whatever it is that comes to everyone, it hasn’t come to him. Not yet.”

He says nothing, just holds me close, but my need to convince him keeps me talking.

“I live with Grandad, and he is not senile.” I plead, wanting him to understand. “Yes, he forgets little things that don’t matter much. Yes, he repeats himself, and when he’s tired or ill he struggles to focus. But he isn’t confused about the things that matter.”

Hal pulls away from me, his arms dropping. “Sometimes he does get confused about the things that matter.”

“No, never.”

“He was confused about selling the house.”

“Only because they tired him out.”

“Elodie. When you get tired, do you make such mistakes? No.”

“I’m young.”

“That’s what we’re talking about, he is in his nineties. He’s not the man he used to be.”

I feel like Grandad is standing on a boat, and I’m holding the only rope that could keep him from drifting out to sea. And everyone around me is shouting for me to let go.

Grandad is selfless, he let me do whatever I wanted in the house, in the shop. The only thing that he wants is to keep his good name.

“I can’t do that to him—”

“Then what?” He snaps, finally showing the strain I’ve felt in him all along this evening. “What are you saying? That he wasn’t confused at all? That he knew what he was doing? He knew what it would mean to me?”

“You don’t seriously think that?” I glare at him.

“No, but as you pointed out, I don’t really understand him. I’ve never understood any of the things he did to us.”

I knew this was going to come up again. The old feud. All he sees when he looks at Grandad is the Hedge LeFevre who was their enemy.

We walk on, I’m no longer sure where. Stupidly, I left Pierre’s little map behind and now it’s completely dark so when we come out of the apple orchard, we’re not by the stream as we should be. For all I know, we could be miles in the opposite direction.

Hal doesn’t seem to notice or care because he now tries again to convince me. “Elodie think about me. I have risked everything for this project. I’ve quit my job and taken on so much financial liability, I’d be ruined. And not just me, my family too. I understand you love and respect your grandfather and want to protect his reputation and his feelings, it’s just…” He clamps his mouth shut, but I can see something in his eyes, deep behind the blue-green glittering in the starlight. There is blame!

“There must be another way, we just need to find it. We can try a legal challenge. Grandad can make a statement saying he was told it’s the old shop. There is a case, but if we call him senile then we can’t rely on his statement, can we?”

He takes a deep breath and holds it, as if he’s willing himself to be calm. His face is pale again. “The same argument works in the other direction. If you try the legal challenge and rely on his statement, you’re saying you trust his judgement. If the case fails, you won’t be able to go down the mental incapacity route anymore because it’ll look like —”

“Why do you think it’ll fail?”

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