“I don’t do a job.”
“So how do you pay for stuff?”
“I was… well, I was both lucky and unlucky, I suppose. My mum and dad died when I was quite young and left me a million pounds.”
Daisy gasps.
I continue. “My brother bought a house with his. I put mine in the bank and I live off the interest.”
“What’s interest?”
“It’s what a bank pays you to let them keep your money when you’re not spending it. It’s not much, but it’s enough to pay for the basics.”
“Why don’t you just buy a house?”
“Because then I’d need to get a job to pay for the upkeep of the house.”
“Well, what about a small apartment then?”
I sigh. Good questions, all of them. I smile at Daisy and shrug. “Just not my cup of tea. Property. In my will, whatever’s left over goes to my kids. I don’t want it all tied up in knots for them.”
“You’ve got kids?”
“Yes. They think I’m a nut. But it’s fine. I know what I am. I knowmy own limitations. I’m a free spirit. I know what works for me and what doesn’t. It’s good.”
“I can’t believe you’re a millionaire,” says Daisy, shaking her head. “Wow.”
I see Jessamine throw me a look. It’s a look of skepticism, but with a softness that shows she knows I’m telling the truth. Because I am. And now I’ve made myself vulnerable. Now she knows my big secret and she could, if she wanted, try to take advantage of me, but the money’s locked down. I can barely get to it, let alone anyone else. She’d have to work me so hard to get a penny out of me.
After we drop Daisy at school, I suggest a walk, a coffee in the village.
“Was that true?” she asks me urgently as we head down a narrow alleyway together. “What you told Daisy about your money?”
“Totally true. I’m living a good life this way. I’m free. I can… meander, you know. And if that means that one day I cross paths with someone who makes me feel compelled to turn up at their house uninvited with a bottle of champagne one dark December afternoon, then all the better.”
“Didn’t your children’s mothers try to get the money off you?”
I shrug. “I paid my maintenance. I send them cash on their birthdays, at Christmas. Both of them know what they’ve got coming when I die. Everyone’s happy.” I turn and look at her. “I’m a good person, Jessamine.”
“Then what the hell are you doing hanging around me?”
“You’re a good person too.”
“No, I’m not.” Hugo pulls her gently toward a lamppost and sniffs its base urgently.
“What makes you say that?”
She sighs impatiently. “Listen, Stuart. This is all… I mean, OK, I’m sure you’re agood person.” She says this as if it is purely a theoretical possibility. “I’m sure you are. And I enjoy spending time with you. But you can’t just move into my house, you know. It’s mad.”
“I haven’t moved into your house.”
“Well, you know what I mean. You’ve stayed.”
“I have. And now I can leave. I can leave whenever. Just say the word.”
“But you’ve got nowhere to stay.”
“I’ve always got somewhere to stay.”
