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Sean stepped forward. “Nice to meet you. Martha, is it? Good journey?”
“Great, thanks. Straight through from London.”
Liza looked at her stupidly. “You came by train?”
“Train, and I splurged on a taxi from the station. He moaned all the way.” Martha seemed sympathetic rather than annoyed. “Something about the roads being too narrow and the hedges too high.”
She made Liza feel old. “I assumed you’d drive.”
“I don’t have a car, and anyway I like the train. It’s a good time to read and I always find the rhythm soothing.”
“I am the same,” Kathleen said. “I once traveled from Moscow to Vladivostok on the Trans-Siberian Railway.”
Liza remembered that trip. She’d had meningitis and been so ill she’d had to spend weeks in the hospital. People had talked in hushed voices around her. Her father, white-faced and tense, had never left her bedside. For a short time she’d been the focus of attention, and then her mother had arrived home with postcards and souvenirs from her trip and the focus in the house had shifted.
Did her mother even remember she’d been ill?
“Come and sit down, Martha.” Kathleen rummaged in her file and brought out some pictures. “What do you know about Route 66?”
“I studied The Grapes of Wrath at school, so I know about the people escaping the Dust Bowl in the 1930s, traveling from the Midwest to the California coast. Route 66. The Mother Road. Hated the book as a child, but I’ve reread it five times since then and it’s one of my favorites. Weird how school can put you off something, instead of inspiring you. Apart from that,” Martha pondered, “I know the road was decommissioned and replaced by the interstate, but presumably you want to stick to the historic Route 66 wherever we can?”
“I do.” Kathleen looked delighted. “My dream is to rent a classic Ford Mustang and travel in style, but then I thought maybe I’m too old for that.”
Finally, Liza thought. Some common sense on display.
Kathleen continued. “Instead I’ve decided that we’ll rent the fanciest, most up-to-date Mustang convertible available. With air-conditioning of course, because when we reach Needles, on the state line between Arizona and California, the temperatures will be hot enough to roast a hog.”
A Mustang convertible?
Martha leaned over the pictures, her curls tumbling forward. “We’d look cool, but we’d be boiling to death?”
“Exactly.” Kathleen was charmed. “It’s a sub-tropical desert climate, with huge thunderstorms during the hot summer.”
Liza couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “I assumed you’d rent a safe, modern SUV.”
“Where’s the fun in that?” Kathleen was studying the map. “I read an article that said as long as you drive early in the morning, you can avoid the heat of the day. Can you travel light, Martha? There’s not a lot of room for luggage.”
“Wait—” Liza interrupted. “You’re basically hiring a sports car?”
“It will be fun for Martha.”
Liza thought she saw a flash terror in Martha’s eyes, but decided she was probably seeing a reflection of her own emotions.
“What if you break down?”
“What if we don’t? And anyway, the company said there was a number we could call. With luck they might send a hot guy for Martha.” Kathleen winked at Martha, who laughed.
“If we break down in the desert, we’ll all be hot.”
“This sounds like such fun I’m tempted to hide away in the back seat,” Sean said and Liza wondered why it was left to her to ask the important questions.
“But you can drive, Martha? The minimum age to rent a car in the US is twenty-five.”
“I was twenty five last month.”
She looked younger. Liza resisted the temptation to ask if she could check her birth certificate. “And you don’t mind being away for half the summer?”
“Thank you, Liza.” Her mother gestured to the map. “Come and take a look, Martha. Exciting, isn’t it?”
