‘Emerald.’ Her feelings choked her voice as she hurried over to her stepsister, and then burst into tears.
Emerald didn’t know which of them was the more astonished when she herself closed the distance between them and put her arms around Janey in an almost protective way, before insisting efficiently, ‘Tell me what’s happening.’
‘Nothing,’ Janey managed to sniff through her tears. Who would have thought that having Emerald of all people here would be so immediately reassuring? ‘Nothing’s happened. It’s just that it’s such a relief to see you,’ she admitted. ‘I’ve felt so alone.’
‘Have you seen your father?’ Emerald asked her, covering her own unexpected emotional reaction to Janey’s admission with a practical response.
‘No. Mama, your mother, is with him, and according to the nurses she simply won’t leave him. She’s been told I’m here and that you all know, but she still won’t leave him. You know how devoted to one another they’ve always been.’
‘Have the Hospital said anything?’ Emerald asked her.
‘There’s nothing new they can tell us yet. These next few hours are critical. It must be so awful, mustn’t it? I’ve tried to imagine how I would feel if it was John. I can’t bear to think like that, though; it’s too dreadful to contemplate.’ The words were tumbling out now in her relief at no longer being alone, but whilst they might sound muddled to anyone else, Emerald knew exactly what Janey meant.
For the first time ever, Emerald found herself exchanging looks of shared understanding with her stepsister.
The nausea Emerald had felt earlier returned, but she fought it back. Now was not the time for her to acknowledge how fearful the prospect of being without Drogo made her feel.
‘I’ve never imagined something like this happening. Yo u don’t, do you?’ Janey asked her almost plaintively. ‘Dad’s always seemed so…so just there, and you don’t stop to think that one day he might not be. I’m so afraid for him, Emerald. I don’t want him to die.’ She started to cry again.
‘Then you mustn’t start thinking that he might,’ Emerald told her firmly. ‘You must tell yourself that he’s going to get better.’
Her words had more of an effect on Janey than she had expected. Her stepsister gave her a watery attempt at a smile and told her, ‘I wish I was more like you, Emerald. You’re always so…so in control of things. Nothing ever seems to go wrong for you. You and Drogo are so lucky.’
Lucky? Her? If only Janey knew!
‘Janey, you have a husband who loves you, and two healthy sons,’ Emerald pointed out firmly. Two sons, not just one, and certainly not none at all, she thought. Was Janey really so blind that she couldn’t see that Emerald was the one who envied her and that she had something that Emerald wanted desperately? At her lowest moments she’d often envisaged her siblings, and especially Janey and Polly with their sons, exchanging conspiratorial looks as they discussed her inability to give Drogo an heir. But Janey seemed oblivious to the direction of Emerald’s thoughts. Instead she was shaking her head and giving a bitter little attempt at laughter.
‘Two healthy sons who any day now will be sent home because we can’t pay their school fees any more–that is, if Fitton is still ours and they still have a home to come back to. I was going to ask Daddy if he could help us. Now I feel so selfish for even thinking of that.’
Janey had no idea what had made her admit so much to Emerald, but it was too late now to call back the words and in a strange sort of a way it was actually a relief to have said them. It must be something to do with the immediacy of the situation and the intimacy of the waiting room and all that both portended.
Emerald frowned. She
had always assumed that John and Janey were comfortably off.
‘What’s happened?’ she asked her bluntly. ‘And don’t tell me nothing because something must have.’
The role of sibling confidante was a new one for her and she was surprised at how easily she slipped into it, and even more surprised by how comfortable it felt, almost as though she was taking on something that she had secretly wanted and had felt incomplete without.
‘John invested all our money with a…a friend, who then went and lost it all, is what’s happened,’ Janey told her equally forthrightly, for all the world as though she had been confiding in her all her life. ‘He’s worrying himself sick about it all. I don’t know what I’m going to do, Emerald. If Dad survives this I can’t possibly worry him by telling him and asking him for help.’
‘How much have you lost?’ Emerald asked.
Janey hesitated, looking over her shoulder even though they were the only two people in the waiting room, before admitting, ‘Just over a million pounds–everything we had. You see, when the investment didn’t make the profit they had been expecting they all put more money in on the advice of this so-called friend. Poor John. It’s all so difficult for him. You see, he’s always been so good with money, and so…so sensible and dependable. I’ve leaned on him all through our marriage, and now I feel–well, I feel guilty, Emerald. I should have taken more interest in our financial affairs. I shouldn’t have just expected him to shoulder all the responsibility.’
Emerald thought quickly as she absorbed what Janey had told her. Drogo had said that the family would need her, but even Drogo could not have anticipated something like this.
‘Look, why don’t you let me help you?’
Janey’s face went bright red. ‘You? But…well, why should you?’
Why indeed?
‘We are family,’ was the only answer Emerald could give her, ‘and my mother is bound to sense that something is wrong. You know what she’s like.’
‘Well, yes,’ Janey agreed. ‘But I couldn’t take money from you, Emerald.’ She sounded mortified. ‘I didn’t tell you because…of that, and besides, John would never agree. His pride would be dreadfully hurt.’
‘Then don’t tell him,’ Emerald said practically.