Tess called while Anna was trying to remember where she'd put the room key.
She had slept with it beside the phone, then moved it while making tea. Now the phone rang on the chest and the key lay beneath it.
“Hello.”
“Mum?”
Anna liked the word enough to misunderstand the tone for a moment.
“Yes.”
“Did you say you'd damage Granddad's van?”
She sat on the bed.
“No.”
“Did you say something he might have heard that way?”
“No. Who told him?”
Tess breathed out.
“Rachel.”
Anna looked at the mug. There was a little tea caught around the rim where the water had risen too high.
“She told him I said that?”
“Yes.”
“I didn't.”
“I asked him what you said. He said Rachel heard you say you'd put a window through it if I went without you.”
Anna stood.
“That didn't happen.”
“I know you were upset yesterday.”
“Yes. I was upset. I didn't say anything about a window.”
Tess was quiet. Anna could hear movement at the other end, a drawer perhaps, a little thud.
“Where are you?”
“Home.”
“With him?”
“He's downstairs.”
“What did he say?”
“He's not lending it.”
Anna shut her eyes.
“He can't—”
“He can. It's his van.”
“I mean he can't do this after you've planned everything.”
“He says we can find another way.”
Anna felt the absurd urge to explain that she was the one who'd found another way all her life. Clothes washed at midnight, food made from what remained, a child told yes when a mother didn't know how she'd afford it. Then prison. Other ways for fourteen years.
Tess had her own problem now.
“What can I do?”
“Tell me exactly what you said.”
Anna took the cardigan from the chair and put it down again.
“I talked about how much I'd liked going with you. That I wanted more of it. I said I couldn't bear another long separation. I said he could lend you the van, when other people could give you things and I wasn't there for them.”
“Right.”
“I wasn't threatening it. I was saying how it felt.”
“I think I believe you.”
The qualification stung. Anna wanted to ask what a mother had to do to get a whole belief.
“Thank you.”
“I'll speak to him again.”
“I'll come.”
“Mum—”
“I'll come and speak to him.”
“Don't make it worse.”
The old anger rose so fast Anna couldn't remember what she intended to say before it.
“How could I make it worse than somebody inventing something I didn't do?”
Tess went silent.
Anna gripped the back of the chair. She could hear the visits room, her own voice filling it, the child being required to listen.
“I mean,” she said, forcing the words apart, “I won't shout at you. Or tell him you made me come. I want him to hear me.”
“All right.”
“Where will you be?”
“I have to go to the rooms. Ruby's already looking at hire.”
“Have you told her?”
“Yes.”
Anna looked at the phone screen, Tess's name bright against the dark.
“I'll tell you what he says.”
“Okay.”
They ended the call. Anna pulled the cardigan on, found the key and left the tea.
Paula was sweeping the landing.
“You all right?”
“I need to go out.”
“There isn't a curfew.”
“I know.”
Paula lowered the broom. Anna went past before she could ask another question.
Outside she rang Rachel. The call went to voicemail. She left a message.
“Tess has told me what you said to my dad. I didn't say it. Ring me.”
She had never left a message like that before. Once she'd made the recording stop, the phone looked too harmless for the words it held.
Leonard's van stood at the side of the house. Anna knew it. He used to take her to school in a different one, leaving her near the corner because she complained people would see. This van was cleaner, white with a grey patch where an old sign had been. Somebody had washed the windscreen.
She opened the gate and knocked.
Leonard answered with a dishcloth in one hand.
“Anna.”
“Let me in.”
He stepped aside. She went through to the kitchen without waiting for an invitation, then stood because sitting would make her feel contained.
“You've been speaking to Tess,” he said.
“Yes.”
He put the cloth beside the sink.
“I don't want a row.”
“I don't want one either. I didn't say I'd damage your van.”
“She heard you.”
“No.”
He looked at her.
“She's not going to invent something like that.”
Anna's fingers tightened at her sides.
“That's what you said before.”
“Anna.”
“You thought I killed someone because she said she saw me leaving. Now you think I'll smash a window because she says she heard me.”
“That isn't the same thing.”
“It is from here.”
He turned toward the kettle. Anna watched him stop before picking it up, perhaps remembering she wouldn't want tea.
“You were upset about the tour.”
“Yes.”
“You were angry.”
“Yes.”
“Then perhaps you said something you didn't—”
“No. Listen to this bit. I didn't say it.”
He folded the cloth. His hands were slower than she'd remembered, the knuckles thicker. A father could grow old without growing easier to reach.
“I don't think you would do it.”
“Then give them the van.”
“I can't take the chance.”
“Because you believe I might do it.”
“Because I don't want Tess in the middle of something that could become a mess.”
“She's in the middle now. You've put her there.”
He looked up sharply.
“You think I don't care what this does to her?”
“I think caring isn't helping you hear me.”
For a moment there was enough silence to hold the words. Anna could see he'd heard them. She wanted to stay there rather than speak until they became easier to dismiss.
Leonard sat.
“Rachel came to us when things were difficult,” he said.
“I know that now.”
“She didn't ask for anything.”
Anna looked at the table. Tess's glass wasn't there today.
“I didn't either.”
“You asked us to bring Tess. Asked her to come. She was a child.”
“She was my child.”
“She was frightened.”
The sentence hurt because Anna could remember the fear and the ways she made it worse. Leonard had held that memory so long it seemed to have become the only mother he trusted.
“I know what happened in that room,” she said. “I know I shouldn't have said those things. It doesn't mean I said this one.”
He looked down.
Anna leaned a hand against the table.
“I would like you to believe me about one thing without asking Rachel first.”
“It's not as simple as that.”
“Why?”
He had no immediate answer. Outside somebody started a lawnmower. The sound grew, then settled.
“Because I have to think about all of it,” he said.
“I've been thinking about all of it every day.”
He rubbed the cloth between his fingers.
“I've withdrawn the van. They'll make other arrangements. Tess is eighteen. I can't stop her going.”
“No. You can just make it harder.”
He stared at the cloth. Anna wanted to take it from him, make him leave the little familiar movement and look at her properly.
Instead she let go of the table.
“You should be ashamed.”
He didn't answer.
She went toward the hall. The trainers weren't there. Tess had left.
At the door Leonard said, “I didn't want you to be hurt again.”
Anna turned.
“Who?”
He looked at her. She waited until he understood the question, then left.
The van stood where he'd put it. She walked past without touching anything.
Rachel had replied.
I've heard your message. Tess is coming in. I will ring you.
Anna looked at the words while standing outside the gate. Tess coming in: the witness still had a place to receive Tess while the mother went home with another denied act in her mouth.
She called immediately.
This time Rachel answered.
“I didn't say it,” Anna said.
“I know you're upset.”
“Don't begin there.”
“All right.”
“I want you to tell him you invented it.”
Rachel was quiet.
“I heard how distressed you were about going.”
“That isn't what you told him.”
“No.”
“You said I threatened it.”
Rachel breathed. Anna could hear the shop, a hanger moving, the little bell.
“I can't do this properly now,” Rachel said. “Tess is here.”
“Good. Say it in front of her.”
“We need to speak.”
“Then speak.”
“I will. Let me speak to Tess first.”
Anna wanted to keep her on the phone until she had given the sentence back. She could hear how easily the conversation could become an account of Anna refusing to stop.
“I'll see you,” she said.
“Yes.”
“And there isn't going to be a version where I misunderstood my own words.”
“I know.”
She ended the call.
At the corner Anna called Tess again.
“He won't lend it.”
“I know.”
“You've spoken?”
“Earlier.”
“He says he doesn't think I'd actually do it. Then acts as though I will.”
Tess sighed.
“Ruby's getting prices.”
Anna looked down the street toward the station.
“Can I come to the rooms?”
“Later. We need to work some things out first.”
“All right.”
“I'll text.”
Anna let Tess end the conversation. She hadn't asked Tess to take a side loudly enough for Leonard to hear. She hadn't asked her to come back and prove she believed.
The key was warm in her palm when she reached the guesthouse.
In the little room her tea had gone cold. She tipped it away, washed the mug and began again. The blouse she wore to Ashcombe was hanging near the window, dry now. It had smelled of the Ashcombe music room, the hot crowded air, a person's wanted company.
Anna touched the sleeve.
Then she moved the chair to face the window and waited for the next thing she could do.