I glance over at Powell Imrie, who has his back to us now. He’s talking to Murdo, who is looking round Powell’s broad shoulder at his dad, Ellie and me, and might be trying to get past Powell to get to us. Powell seems to be placating him. No sign of the other brothers.
Ellie smiles calmly, first at me, then at Don. ‘Whereas the feelings that matter most here are mine, don’t you think, Dad?’
Don is back to staring at me. His eyes are definitely narrowed now. ‘Aye, if you say so, love.’ He seems to shake himself out of something and looks at her. ‘So what are your “feelings”?’ he asks. The quotation marks are as obviously present as the question mark, moments earlier, was effectively absent.
Ellie takes her dad’s upper arm in one hand and mine in the other, holding us like a ref before a boxing match. ‘To tell the truth, I’m not sure yet,’ she says. ‘I’m still trying to decide how I feel.’
Don shakes his head. ‘Hen, if you need to think about it, then—’
‘Actually, your dad might be right here,’ I butt in.
Don glares at me. ‘You a fuckin mind reader?’ he hisses at me. ‘You think you know what I’m goin to say? You think you know what I’m
‘I was trying to agree—’ I protest.
‘I don’t need you agreein with anything I—’
‘Will you both just stop?’ Ellie says gently. She squeezes my arm a little. Probably his too. ‘This is about me? Hello? And I’m still thinking, and we’ll talk about this, sensibly, I hope, when I’ve decided how I feel? That okay, Dad?’ she asks, tipping her head towards Don, her hair swinging gracefully. Don looks thoughtful. ‘Maybe,’ he concedes.
‘Stewart?’ she asks.
‘Wish I knew what this was meant to accomplish, I confess.’
‘Clearing the air,’ Ellie says, to both me and Don. ‘Just because you might not want to hear something doesn’t mean it doesn’t need saying.’ She looks at Don. ‘Dad, Stewart and I are going to take a wee walk, okay?’ She looks at me. ‘Okay?’
‘Okay,’ I say.
She looks back at Don. ‘Okay?’
‘Can’t stop you going for a walk, love,’ Don says. He seems more wary than angry now.
‘Good. Mum’s gone to her class,’ Ellie tells Don. ‘She’ll be back about four.’
‘Aye, okay. I’ll make sure the posse’s back for then.’
‘I’ll see you later, Dad.’ Ellie leans in to kiss him on the cheek. ‘Stewart,’ she says, letting go of her father and turning back towards the main doors, ‘shall we?’
We walk out of the hotel and down into the gardens. The af ternoon light, filtered through high cloud, makes the breaking rollers of the slack-water tide glow beneath the great standing wave of mist still banked over the margins of the sea.
As we walk down past the second terrace, between topiary and curved wooden benches, Ellie gives a small laugh, nods to one side and says, ‘I had my own little micro-fling here, an hour or two before you and Jel got jiggy.’
I look at her, eyebrows raised.
‘Dean Watts,’ she tells me. ‘Remember him?’
‘Yep.’
Ellie nods. ‘I sort of let him kiss me. Just back there,’ she says as we start down the next flight of steps.
‘Yep.’
She glances at me. ‘“Yep”?’
‘I know. I saw,’ I tell her.
She stops, and I have to stop too, so we’re facing each other, halfway down the flight of steps. ‘Was that why you went off with Jel?’ she asks. She looks as serious as she has all day.
I shake my head. ‘My guilty conscience did its best to persuade me it was, but… no. I don’t think it made a blind bit of difference, El. Too small to measure even if it did.’
‘So you saw me and Dean?’
‘Yeah. I wasn’t following you; just coincidence. But yes.’
‘Hmm. You never said.’
‘I didn’t get much opportunity before, and afterwards it would just have sounded petty, and like I was blaming you for something that was all my own work.’
She hoists one eyebrow. ‘And Jel’s.’
‘Well, yeah, though I don’t think she did it to get at you, if that’s any comfort.’ I shrug. ‘It was just two people thinking only of themselves, pure selfishness. Well, impure.’
‘Had you two ever…?’
‘No. Does that make it better or worse?’
Ellie looks down, considering. She shrugs. ‘Don’t know.’
We resume our descent of the stone stairs.
‘Grier told Jel that you’d always wanted to get off with her, with Jel, I mean,’ Ellie says. We keep on walking.
‘Did she now?’ I say, nodding. ‘I thought she might have.’
‘Jel let it slip once.’ El turns briefly to me. ‘Jel and I had a drunken night of blame, recrimination, apologies, forgiveness and some wine-fuelled tears and hugs a couple of years back,’ she explains. ‘Met up on the sticky carpets of Jings, of all places.’ She shakes her head, eyes wide. ‘Jings. Jesus.’
