(1989) Dreamer by Peter James

think it was grand enough. He had had it gutted, rooms knocked through, new mouldings on the walls and ceilings, a swimming pool dug out, a hard tennis court laid. Money pouring out like water; money she didn’t know they had. Money that Andreas seemed to magically provide through deals she did not understand. Andreas, the Swiss banker whom Richard had befriended, had become obsessed with, talked to on the phone constantly when he was at home, fawned over when he had come to dinner. She wondered whether Richard had begun to change when the money started to roll; or was it when he had started going with the tart in the office? Or was it Andreas? Andreas whom she had finally met two nights ago. With his black leather glove.
    They’d lost part of the roof in the hurricane and it was still being fixed now. Rusty scaffolding clung to the wall at one end, a sheet of bright blue tarpaulin flappingfrom it in the wind. Something about the scaffolding did not look right to her – it seemed to have come loose, seemed to be swaying.
    The house was a Victorian farmhouse. The farmer lost both his legs in an accident, and had gassed himself in the tumbledown barn with the exhaust fumes of his car. His widow had sold off the farm and moved away; they’d only heard the story after they’d bought the house and she wondered if she would have tried to dissuade Richard had she known. Since she had heard the history, she always felt the house had a slightly melancholic feeling to it. It was the inside she liked most: the large, elegant rooms, some which they had made even larger, large enough to entertain in style, but not so large the place wouldn’t feel like a home.
    She swung the steering wheel to avoid a crater in the crumbling driveway. ‘That’s a job you can have, Tiger,’ she said, more brightly than she felt. ‘You can fill in the holes.’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Why not, Nicky?’ said Helen.
    ‘Umm. Coz there might be fish in them.’
    The gravel of the circular drive rattled against the underside of the Range Rover, thick wall-to-wall gravel that the wheels sank into up to their hubs. She pulled on the handbrake and switched off the engine. Silence. Peace. She felt a gust of wind rock the car. Nicky tugged excitedly at his door handle. ‘Birthday tomorrow! Yeah!’
    ‘You’re looking forward to it, aren’t you?’ said Helen.
    ‘Yeah!’
    ‘“Yes”, darling, “yes”, not “yeah”. Okay?’
    He hesitated, then grinned impudently at his mother. ‘Yeah!’ he said. ‘Yeah! Yeah!’ He jumped down and ran across the drive.
    Sam looked at Helen, shaking her head and smiling. Helen blushed. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I’m trying to get him out of it. He’s very strong willed.’
    ‘Like his father,’ Sam said, opening her door and stepping down. The wind tugged her hair, pulling her backwards, and a piece of grit blew into her right eye making it smart. She blinked hard, dabbing it with her handkerchief, then opened the tailgate.
    She paused for a moment and stared at the view. Straight down over the fields down to the banks of the River Ouse, the open fields beyond, and the South Downs in the distance beyond that. To the right, the spires and walls of Lewes, the chalk bluffs and the ruined castle perched on the hill. Even on a bleak, blustery January morning, with the flattened trees with their roots in the air, it was stunning. Exhilarating. She wished she could put her wellies on and walk off into it right now, as she turned and hefted the first box of groceries towards the house, glancing up at the scaffolding again and the blue sheeting that flapped and cracked like a backing sail.
    She opened the door and the smell of fresh paint engulfed her. She sniffed it, and it felt good. Helen followed her in, holding a bulging brown bag.
    ‘God it’s cold!’ Sam carried the box through and dumped it on the kitchen table. She stared proudly at her brand new navy Aga, and switched it on, listening to the tick of its