Free Swimming Pool Sunday by Sophie Kinsella, Madeleine Wickham Page B

Louise heard was Amelia’s, saying, ‘Katie’s never done a back dive before.’
    And then there was just the sight of Katie’s small body arching inexpertly in the air, looping round too far, until her head was directly above the corner of the diving-board. And then there was the sickening crack as the board smacked upwards, hitting her head with a terrible malevolent force. And then there was the silence, as her apparently lifeless little body slithered quietly down into the water.

Chapter Five
    Cassian Brown was driving back to Melbrook from London, in self-congratulatory mood. He had spent most of the weekend in meetings with one of his law firm’s most important Middle Eastern clients, striking a complicated out of court settlement worth, in the end, just short of £800,000. Which, he had to admit to himself, was of no great significance, financially, for the client. But still, it had been a triumph of negotiation. And even though he himself had played only a relatively small role in the dealings, his contribution would, he was sure, have been recognized by those that mattered.
    Now he wondered to himself whether it would be worth telephoning Desmond Pickering, head of litigation at the London office. A casual friendly call, just to ensure that Desmond was aware of Cassian’s part in the proceedings; just to make certain that no-one else was claiming too much of the credit. He could, Cassian thought, perhaps suggest an informal lunch meeting. Or even invite Desmond down to Melbrook for the weekend. Londoners, he’d noticed, were all too eager to come down to the country if it was only an hour or so away on the motorway.
    They could drink white wine, sitting in Cassian’s pretty little cottage garden, and talk business discreetly, and perhaps stroll around the village. And then he could introduce Desmond to Louise. Desmond would be impressed by Louise. The daughter of Lord Page, no less. The Honourable Louise Kember.
    Kember. Cassian frowned. Such an ungainly name, like its owner. Why on earth had Louise taken on the surname of that oaf? And why, more to the point, had she married him in the first place?
    Cassian liked to think that he had spotted the potential of Louise even before he’d been informed of her relationship to Lord Page. He’d noticed her immediately, he told himself; he’d seen at once that she was stifled, bored and suffering from a lack of stimulation. She was intelligent and educated, yet she was expected to have no interests above those of her children, the village, and that insufferable boor of a husband.
    A picture of Barnaby’s face swam into Cassian’s mind: dim and brutish, with the suspicious stare of an ill-educated peasant. Those huge hulking shoulders, those clumsy hands, those boots, always caked in mud. And the inarticulateness of the man! Cassian recalled their very first meeting at a drinks party. He had attempted a number of pleasant conversational gambits, and Barnaby had seemed incapable of responding with anything more than a shrug or a grunt or a monosyllable.
    Louise, on the other hand, had positively sparkled with wit and charm and important names. Cassian recalled, again, the frisson he’d received when she’d casually referred to current cabinet ministers by their Christian names; when she’d spoken, with the disparaging tone of an insider, of Commons food; then, later, after a few more drinks, when she’d related the story of the time the Prime Minister telephoned and she was the only one in, and she thought it was a hoaxer and didn’t pass the message on.
    Little idiot! Cassian gave a small grin. For all her knowledgeable veneer, Louise had, he’d soon discovered, less of a grip on the world of politics than she liked to think she had. Her mind revolved, he often observed, along the peculiarly feminine parochial grooves which he had noticed in female colleagues atwork. They all had the same insistence on knowing irrelevant details; the same ability to take an