The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike) Part 1257 by Angharad Copyright © 2011 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

Life was hectic for the next four or five days, as I travelled up and down to London daily until Daddy was discharged from hospital. When I collected him, Jolene came in despite it being her rest day and we had a good hug before we parted. “You’re something special, d’ya know that?” she said as we walked from the hospital.

“You’re pretty good yourself, for a Sheila, that is.” My reply made her scowl at me then she laughed.

“Girl power,” she called raising her fist in the air.

“Quite,” I called back and loaded Daddy into my car. The drive home was uneventful, we chatted but I didn’t tell him about Diana. She’d died from a pulmonary embolism arising from an undiagnosed DVT in her leg after her long flight, or so the Foreign Office told Henry. He vaguely knew the couple and in some ways it seemed sad they’d both died, they were Daddy’s friends after all.

The bodies were to be cremated in India and then flown home to be interred at a cemetery near Salisbury. I would offer to take him when the date was known, but I couldn’t shed tears for someone I despised with my every breath.

The children made an awful fuss of their Grampa when they got home from school and he ran out of knees for them to sit on, so they cuddled up tight on the sofa with him.

I left him to cope with it and went to make the evening meal–nothing fancy, a plain roast chicken–for all of us–one about the size of an ostrich. Tomorrow, I would make soup for us and a chicken curry for him, I hoped he’d appreciate it.

Over dinner, the problem of little piggies and big ears cropped up big time. The children had heard me talking with Simon about Diana’s death, although neither of us were aware we were being overheard at the time.

It happened like this. We were finishing dinner–in fact I was clearing the dirty crocks to shove in the dishwasher when Tom declared he was going to email the Foreign Office to push the Indian government to ask for clemency for Diana, given her recently widowed status.

I pretended not to hear him as did Simon and Jenny, Stella was out with Gareth and Puddin’. However, Mima had no such inhibitions. “ Oh she’s dead, Gwamps.”

“Whit?” gasped Daddy.

“Wady Diana’s dead, I wistened to Mummy and Daddy talking.”

Daddy looked at me in astonishment and I blushed, “Cathy, whit’s a’ this aboot.”

Feeling betrayed by my own stupidity and embarrassed to hell, I stuttered and stumbled an apology.

“Is this richt?”

I nodded.

“I tak’ it ye were going to tell me?”

“Of course, I just wanted to wait until you were strong enough to cope, I know she was a good friend.”

“Sae ye ken when I’m strong enough, dae ye? Sae ye can lie an’ deceive me, because ye didnae like her.”

Simon shooed the children out of the dining room and Jenny went with them.

“It wasn’t like that, Daddy, you were very ill–you nearly died.”

“Weel mebbe that’d hae been better than learnin’ ma dochter wis a liar.”

“Steady on, Tom, it was my idea not to tell you just yet, not Cathy’s.” Simon was deliberately trying to draw his fire, perhaps hoping that if Tom’s anger calmed I’d then be able to talk to him quietly, instead of this high drama stuff.

“Sae wha gi’s ye thae richt tae mak’ decisions fa me? I'm no in ma dotage yet, Mister.”

“Daddy, please, can we sit down and discuss this quietly like civilised adults.”

“Mair like a nest o’ vipers,” he spat and stalked off to his study where he slammed the door hard causing some dust to drop from the plaster in the hallway.

“Oops,” said Simon as if he’d just dropped a difficult catch at a village cricket match. “So what do we do now?”

I crumpled on to a dining chair and burst into tears. “That bloody woman is still causing me trouble even though she’s dead.”

Si put his hand on my shoulder, “You do your best for him, he’ll see that one day.”

“One day?” I squealed and sobbed loudly. “I’ve never known him like this, he used to be the kindest man in England. Now he’s so short tempered.”

“Yes, Babes, but he has just discovered he’d lost the love of his life and thought you were concealing it from him.”

“I was, but for his sake–he nearly died, Si, it was so close, I had to work really hard with him not to die. It’s not as if she was good for him, she was a class A bitch, who screwed him up when he was younger, too. I’m glad she’s dead.”

“How d’you know about the ancient history between them?”

“I just do–it was something I saw or thought I saw.”

“With Diana?”

“When I was working on Daddy, I got a glimpse of his early life with her. She left him because Godrick had more chance of making the big time.”

“Did they have any children?”

“Don’t think so, I hope the local cat’s home gets it all rather than the Treasury.”

“Quite,” agreed Simon, “his stock is going to drop significantly.”

“So are you going to sell yours?”

“No, just the opposite, now might be a good time to buy–they were doing some quite exciting things with stem cells.”

“Were they–I hope they haven’t cloned that bitch, with my luck, they have.”

“Don’t be silly–that only happens in sci-fi stories.”

“No it doesn’t, look at Dolly the sheep, and some woman had her dead dog cloned.”

“It’s illegal in humans.”

“She wasn’t human.”

“Cathy, don’t be silly.”

“She wasn’t, she was a monster–a chimera.”

“Wow, whatever one of those is.”

I wiped my eyes and blew my nose and went back to my chores. A little later Daddy walked back in with Trish, they were holding hands. “Gramps wants to say something, don’t you, Gramps?”

He shuffled a little then red as a tomato he said, “I’m sorry I over reacted, ye were wrong to keep me in thae dark, but I understand you did it for thae best o’ reasons.”

I couldn’t respond, I was lost for words.

“It’s alright, Mummy, Gramps and me discussed it, he understands now.” Six years old, and interceding in family disputes. At this rate she’ll be running the UN by the time she’s ten.

“Aye, she’s a bonny lassie,” he put his hand round her shoulder and they went back to his study.

Simon looked at me and we both sniggered. “What d’you think she said to him?” he asked.

“I have no idea, and I’m not sure I want to know.” I had tears running down my face with the stress and then the surreal experience I’d just had.

Simon engulfed me with a monster hug, “With all these women about, there’s never a dull moment in this house, is there?”

“Only because you men don’t understand us,” I said wiping my nose in his shirt.

“Ugh, you dirty pig,” he said and as I ran off he chased after me stripping off his shirt as he came, which I suspect he was going to rub on my face or hair.