Free Before I Met You by Lisa Jewell Page B

girl.’
    ‘Aw,’ said Alexandra, facetiously, ‘bless.’
    Betty recognised the dynamic; it was the same as the one between Bella and her younger brother, the grudging affection, the condescending praise.
    ‘Is he younger than you?’ she asked knowingly.
    ‘Yeah. He is my baby brother by a matter of eighteen months. And one day. And, yes, I know, we look nothing alike. He is a carbon copy of our father and I am a carbon copy of our mother. And our older sister sneakily managed to take the best of both of them and is about the most beautiful person I know.’ She raised her eyebrows sardonically.
    Alexandra pulled the coat closed and fiddled with the hook-and-eye fastenings. Then, rather dramatically, she plunged her hands into the pockets of the coat, with a facial expression reminiscent of that of a country vet examining a pregnant ewe. ‘Lovely deep pockets,’ she said. And then: ‘Oh, this must be yours.’ Alexandra pulled out a piece of folded paper.
    ‘Oh,’ Betty said, taking the paper from Alexandra’s hand. ‘Wow. Let me see …’
    She opened the paper to see Arlette’s handwriting. It was her pre-stroke writing, neat and controlled, spelling out a name and address:
    Peter Lawler
    22a Rodney Gardens
    London
    SW5 3DF
    Her heart leaped with excitement. ‘Any idea where that is?’ she asked, showing the paper to Alexandra.
    ‘Ah,’ Alexandra said knowingly, ‘South Ken. Very smart. Friend of your grandmother’s?’
    Betty shrugged. ‘Not that I know of. But then I think there are a few things we didn’t know about my grandmother.’
    ‘Ooh,’ said Alexandra, ‘a mystery, then. I do love a good mystery. You’ll have to go and check it out. Might be a long-lost love. God, might be a long-lost
relative
.’ She winked over her glasses and then removed them, rubbing gently at the bridge of her nose. ‘Anyway. Lovely coat. Lovely condition. I can give you two hundred and fifty pounds for it.’
    ‘Oh.’ Betty felt her heart plummet with disappointment.
    Alexandra looked at her kindly. ‘Not much of a market for fur these days, sweetheart. I mean, you could hold on to it for a few years, see if they come back into fashion, but even then,’ she shrugged, ‘it’s a good offer. I’d take it, if I were you. Well, if money’s the issue?’
    Betty paused and considered the suggestion. She pictured Arlette, standing in the doorway of the house on the cliff, all those years ago, in her remarkable red shoes, looking at her with that inscrutable gaze, making Betty feel like she could be anything she wanted. She thought of the smell in Arlette’s boudoir, of the dull, exotic light cast through half-drawn chintz, the sense of another time, another place, another world. The coat summed it all up: obsolete, out of fashion, but still alive with glamour. She would never wear it again. No one in their right mind would ever wear it again. Maybe she would keep it for ever, keep it for an imaginary unborn daughter, keep it for posterity. But then she closed her eyes and imagined the coat on the back of a famous actress, lights, music, action, clapperboards, make-up artists and dry ice.
    ‘No,’ she shook her head, ‘money’s not the issue. But I’d like to sell it, anyway. If that’s OK.’
    ‘That is OK, yes. Cash OK?’
    ‘Cash would be great. Thank you.’
    Betty’s arms felt oddly empty as she left Alexandra’s studio a moment later, as though she’d just handed over a child or a pet. Her shoulder bag, however, felt ripe and heavy with the twenty-pound notes that Alexandra had just counted into her hands. And there, nestled against the palm of the hand in the pocket of her coat was the paper with the mysterious address on it.
    Rodney Gardens was, as Alexandra had suggested, very smart indeed. Twin terraces of oversized red-brick houses with stucco pillars and tiled steps, each house immaculate.
    Number 22a was in a house in keeping with the rest of the street. Doorbells were housed in a