Ghosts from the Past

by Sally Spedding

“Move.”

  “I can’t.”

  “You bloody will, or we’ll be rounding up Monsieur Gallas quicker than he can take a leak, and you can explain why your and Sophie Kassel’s heads are ringed in black on that delightful church choir tape I found in your car.”

  33. Laure.

  Sunday 13th March. 11.15 a.m

  The randy bitch was late. Another of her pathetic little power games, but this time she was going to learn a lesson. Big time, as Cerys would have said.

  *

  With Jean-Claude Houbron leading the way out of Soulebec, I’d ridden Vervain past a half-built housing development and into the kind of blank space that had swallowed the Deschamps and Jourdain families up for all their lives. A white infinity where it was almost possible to believe the earth was flat.

  All I’d thought of, was Papa with her at Les Saules Pleureurs, yet with each hoof-beat striking the broken, ashphalt track towards Trois Ruisseaux, I’d realised with a growing guilt not just that I’d made him fall, but could he have been about to tell me something? To warn me?

  The grey clouds overhead had turned black as we’d progressed, and snow was settling. Jean-Claude had wobbled his way towards the Kassel’s closed, iron-slatted gates which stood grimly forbidding as if guarding some industrial estate, not a house. I’d spotted a discreet camera, mounted on either side, plus an intercom system, all installed since I’d last seen the girl who’d struggled at school.

  I’d also begun to shiver. To wonder when to use my phone again. A ‘no brainer’ as Cerys again would say, but I’d wanted this encounter with my aunt and John Lyon over as quickly as possible. Yes, as quickly as possible.

  “I’ve just remembered something else,” Jean-Claude had said, about to press the intercom button. “Should have mentioned it earlier, but I’ve been dashing back and fore…”

  “What?”

  “Maman’s brother was staying over near Dienné last night and heard this helicopter hovering over some farm. I’m trying to remember the name. Later, when it had landed, he heard an elderly woman yelling out a name.”

  “What on earth has this to do with me?” I’d asked, slipping off Vervain’s sweaty back and holding his halter rope tight. Needing to get a move on.

  “Apparently, that name was Mathieu.”

  *

  All the more reason to contact John Lyon again. Yet I wasn’t happy at all about being back here where me and Sophie had once played in the field that bordered the biggest of the three streams. She’d acted the part of a French commander, me the Boche equivalent, and that flowing water had been the Somme. All nonsense, but the police hadn’t thought so at the time, and grilled me more than once about our activities which they, and her Papa had found odd.

  So here I was watching Vervain galloping and bucking around the snowy paddock, churning up a spray of divots as he went. Completely at home, winter coat and all, as if he’d not endured a drugged-up journey back to France. An almost three-day ordeal.

  “Monsieur Kassel’s waited ages to see you.” said Jean-Claude, once the other man’s grainy voice had answered through the intercom’s small grille. “Your being here will help him grieve.”

  “I hope so,” I replied. “Don’t you think I’ve been pretty upset too?”

  *

  Robert Kassel had aged and thinned since I’d last seen him. With still no daughter’s body to bury and that recently dug-up crucifix strung between his fingers at the kitchen table next to his untouched bowl of coffee, he looked a wreck. Just to see him like that - the once successful breeder of Charolais sheep and cattle reduced to a husk - made me want to wrap my arms around him. Give him some hope.

  “Monsieur, it may be best to leave it for the police,” said Jean-Claude.” In case vital clues get contaminated.”

  “I have to clean it,” snapped the man who fourteen years ago had moved his family south from the Mayenne, and still kept the accent. “Sophie did. Every day.”

  *

  So that had been the end of that. And there we were, watching the seconds tick by on his kitchen clock until his dead daughter’s Head teacher and my own Papa showed up. Elisabeth Jourdain, with every qualification under the sun. For whom time was running out.

  “There’s not an hour passes when I don’t think of Sophie,” I said truthfully, holding one of the last colour photos ever taken of his only kid. “And it’s time you had justice, Monsieur. That Enquête was rubbish, wasn’t it?”

  In the loaded silence that followed, I stared at my on-off school friend’s round, smiling face - not unlike that of my own Maman - except that Sophie’s teeth lay beneath a disfiguring iron brace and her mid-brown hair was cut in a severe bob just below her ears. The opposite to my own, ragged crop. She’d also had similar blue eyes, except hers possessed a kind of vacant quality as if she’d never been part of this horrible world. Classmates at school had branded her ‘simple.’ Especially my aunt whose bullying of her wasn’t always so private. Once, I’d overheard her threaten to arrange a transfer to the Special School in Civaux, where some of its pupils either ran away or jumped in front of trains passing through.

  But all Sophie had wanted was to follow St. Thérèse of Lisieux and devote her life to God. And that’s what I told him.

  “She’d often said the same to me,” Robert Kassel said softly. “Not to her Maman, mind, who’d also been to a convent school and knew how restrictive they were. Why she wasn’t too happy when such a fervent Catholic was appointed head.”

  “Opus Dei?” I suggested mischievously, having heard of schools linked to that shadowy, controlling organisation.

  “Never. And I hope we’re not bugged. But I confess, I had hopes that Sophie would stay on here at Trois Ruisseaux to help me run it.” He gestured around the large kitchen dominated by the glowing wood-burning stove to the snowy scene beyond its windows. “Maybe meet and marry another farmer…” His faltering voice tailed away. “Have children…”

  “That’s not selfish,” I said. “Just realistic. She’d have made a lovely Maman.”

  “Why the past tense?”

  Merde…

  “Sorry. It just came out that way.”

  *

  Robert Kassel’s new woman had gone to visit her sister, and Jean-Claude was noisily at work on the nearby barn conversion. His squealing drill caused Vervain to run even faster around the makeshift paddock. Soon my brave survivor would need a rug, good quality hay, concentrates and molasses. Having to scrape through with his hooves to the sodden grass below wasn’t an ideal situation. Meanwhile, little did Jean-Claude, his employer or new partner guess what could soon be unfolding here. Perhaps I’d better give some warning rather than risk the front gates being kept shut.

  “I’ve wanted my aunt to meet you face to face so you can find closure, as the Yanks say in films and TV. It’s time she confessed,” I said.

  “To what?”

  “Sophie’s murder. That’s why she’s coming over. And Papa can be another witness.”

  The farmer looked more than queasy. Pushed his full coffee cup away and took the photo from my hand to turn it face down on the table.

  “Have you set this up?”

  I nodded, not daring to mention John Lyon.

  “Laure,” He began, keeping his eyes on it rather than me. “We can’t say ‘murder.’ I have to have some hope, can’t you see? Just like you with Mathieu…”

  “You can’t fob me off. I’m not dumb.”

  “I know, but I realise you’ve had a hard time recently - it’s been in the news since Saturday - no detail spared - and I also realise that having to settle in a completely different country after losing your mother like that, must have been really tough, but…”

  “But what?” I barked, seeing my opportunity slipping away.

  “We do have a justice system. Not perfect, but one which does mostly work. If the police and our own Examining Magistrate couldn’t find any reason to detain your aunt, then,” he shrugged his thin shoulders. “We ca
n’t take the law into our own hands.”

  “I already have, Monsieur Kassel. And apart from Sophie also telling me how our Head teacher would often hit her in places it wouldn’t show, she actually…”

  “Tèse-toi!” He shouted, unfolding himself to stand by the sink and stare out at Vervain.

  “No. I won’t. She used to touch her. You know, down there. To humiliate her.”

  He spun round. His wasted face almost black against the bright world beyond, where my horse seemed to have merged with land and sky. I picked up the crucifix by its chain. Felt the Saviour’s familiar shape - all his various bumps and lumps identical to my version - and that of Elsabeth Jourdain.

  “I think you should go now, Laure.” Robert Kassel’s tone changed from anger to something less obvious. “You clearly have big problems with your aunt, especially over your Maman’s death and your little brother going missing, however…”

  “She brought Sophie this crucifix,” I interrupted. “Just like her own. And mine.”

  “Why didn’t you speak out at the time?

  “Would you? I was scared. She was on a mission to make us all women of God. That’s how she saw herself, despite shagging Papa, Edwad Gallas and Danny Lennox whom she’s just shot dead…”

  “Where’s yours?” He’d come closer, standing behind me. I got up. I didn’t like men overpowering me. Even a bereaved, unhappy one. “I mean your crucifix.”

  “I got rid in Wales. Not my thing at all.”

  “You must find it. And the shop where they were bought.” He picked the necklace up again and held it against his chest. “This one’s thirty-carat gold and there’s a hallmark behind Christ’s body.” He looked at me with such earnestness, all anger gone, that for a moment I forgot why I was here. “So, not cheap.”

  In the time that he’d left his post by the window, I’d spotted a small, red Peugeot nudging its way down the drive towards the house. Was this them? If so, how come she’d not had to use the intercom? How come it was as if she owned this place as well?

  Then I looked more closely. Two people occupied the front seats. Both of whom I recognised. No other passenger.

  “She’ll be able to tell you, I’m sure,” I said distractedly, to the Norman before he left the room. “Here she is now.”

  *

  Hatred was the wrong word for her expression. Her bruise, like fresh offal, still wept blood after my coat-hanger’s little reminder who was boss. I hoped the wound would spread over her whole, rotten face and down her body to that freaky tattoo, so no-one would shag her ever again.

  As for John Lyon, who’d been driving her car, he looked as rough as dogs. Another of Cerys’s apt expressions - he was shoving her forwards with what seemed to be a gun, while the Peugeot and its odd-looking number plate with 11 at the end, stayed on the other side of the gates. As he came closer, I noticed the tensed-up, stubbled jaw. The uncombed, grey hair jutting out in all directions. What would his Alison have said about that? A wary look in his eyes only slightly altered as Robert Kassel stepped forwards. Something big was up.

  Was this one-time farmer deliberately meeting them both outside, so I couldn’t hear what was to be said?

  Fuck that.

  I opened the window a fraction to listen. My question would have to wait.

  “Who are you?” Kassel addressed my aunt’s captor but didn’t give him time to answer, “And why’s Mademoiselle Jourdain tied up like that?”

  So, he still respected her for having been a Head teacher. Despite what he might or might not have seen in the papers. What a disappointment.

  “You might well ask!” she yelled back, not seeing me. “You wait till I speak to the Maire and Examining Magistrate.” I’m no criminal. But Laure Deschamps is. Where is she?” Her black eyes darted from side to side, resting too long I thought, on Vervain

  Hearing my name like that, John glanced at the farmhouse. Something no half-decent cop would ever have done because in that second, she’d whipped round, loosened the rubber tubing around her wrists, snatched the gun from him and was running towards the paddock.

  “Here you are!” she shouted at Vervain. “And not before time.”

  Non…

  My noble gelding was watching all this with curiosity in his big, dark eyes as the ex-cop caught up with her. Tried to bring her down. But too late.

  So was I, having slipped and fallen off the lower step by the door. The sound of that first gunshot seemed to fill the whole sky. The whole universe. All I could see was my darling horse’s head twisting this way and that as blood poured from his left eye socket. Then came another blast - this time to his heart, making his legs go rigid one by one, accompanied by a scream that made me wish I’d never been born.

  And then, without warning, that crazy, white world around me turned black.

  *

  “And not before time…”

  Those terrible words spun around and around in my mind, on the tip of my tongue, as the clock on my bedside table showed midday, with yet more fresh snow skittering past the spare bedroom window. I could still see the greener patch on the grass where Vervain had exhaled his last breath. Also, his congealed blood and the flattened ground where apparently Robert Kassel, John Lyon and Jean-Claude had helped the police vet drag him into some old horse box…

  It was as if every part of me was packed with that same white stuff falling more heavily now. Not melting, oh no, but a frozen mass numbing up everything, so that when John Lyon came in to tell me that my insane aunt who’d tried to escape, dragging that rubber tubing behind her, had been arrested by a police team from Poitiers, and her car seized for examination. I barely heard him. My mind in meltdown.

  “I’m so bloody sorry, Laure,” John said, sitting on the end of my bed. “It’s was all my fault. When I’d heard your name on her phone, I immediately wondered where you were…”

  Normally I might have reassured him with, “it’s okay,” but how could I?

  “What’ll happen to Vervain now?” I barely whispered.

  “He’ll be properly examined…”

  “Examined? Who by? Not Eduard Gallas at his place?”

  “God, no. An experienced vet, a firearms specialist and other forensic experts.

  “And Mathieu?”

  His hand suddenly covered his mouth. His swollen top lip which I’d wanted to touch. My desperate expression hadn’t gone unnoticed.

  “Don’t worry. He’s on his way to the Préfecture de Police in Paris. There’s been a long delay and it’s a complicated story, but he’s OK.”

  I smiled relief. But it hurt.

  “That new Browning? Where exactly did you find it?”

  “Promise me you won’t panic?”

  “I can’t any more.” But all the same, knew what might be coming next.

  “Under your father’s body. I forced your aunt to show me where she’d left him to die, just like with Alison and myself at that Berthigny windmill.”

  I gripped the top blanket.

  “In the house?”

  A nod.

  “What must have been a smaller tack room.”

  Jesus Christ…

  “Is he dead?”

  “No, but… “

  “Oh, thank God. I’ve been wanting to see him again, to say sorry for thumping him. I just couldn’t help it.” I made sure John saw my grief. “She’d shot him?”

  A nod. A decent man in a lesser man’s clothes.

  “I bet it was his balls.”

  “At the moment, I can’t say. It’s all sub judice… But he’ll live. Don’t worry.”

  Damn.

  A spider descended from the beam over my bed and I squeezed it between my thumb and forefinger until bright yellow goo appeared from its belly and all flailing legs fell still. Such a small but positive gesture made me better able to relay my recent traumatic visit to Les Saules Pleureurs. How scared Papa had seemed. And not just for me…

  John Lyon watched me wipe the mess off my fingers. Hard to tell
what he was thinking, but I didn’t care. Then he quizzed me about the ins and outs of the abandoned transporter still at my old home, and sort of agreed I’d had no choice but to take possession of it. In fact, I even sensed a certain admiration in his tone. Odd, given he was an ex-cop. But I had more questions too.

  “How will Papa react to Vervain being dead, and if he knew my life was no longer worth living?”

  “He’d be deeply shocked of course. But would want you to stay strong. I’ve seen for myself how proud he is of you.”

  Déchets. Rubbish.

  “When can I see him? Today sometime?”

  “Shortly. I’ll need to hire a car. Alison and I had everything stolen last night, and my VW blown to bits.”

  Some enemy.

  “Where’s she now?” I queried as Robert Kassel and Jean-Claude came to stand by the bedroom door. Both with concern etched on their faces. “Have you split up?”

  Her on-off lover stood up and patted the top of my head.

  “No, and she’s fine. Had to get back to Nottingham. I’ve just phoned her, and she sends you her love.”

  Love?

  I couldn’t deal with that and pushed the ‘love’ word away while Robert Kassel beckoned him over. Seconds later, I was alone with just a small, old-fashioned TV for company. Even Jean-Claude had deserted, probably realising I wouldn’t be in much of a mood for a grope. I got up to switch on the set, steadying myself against a chair as I did so. Trying not to look outside, thinking of Papa, Maman, Danny, Vervain and Mathieu all trapped inside the web spun from jealousy and revenge.

  Some dead. Some barely alive, while others had years ahead for yet more mischief. Until I showed my hand…

  Remember the First Circle…you deserve nothing, and God will see to it you get nothing but ice and snow and the deaths of your children and everyone fooled into loving you…

  *

  The lunchtime news bulletin was in full flow. A Welsh butcher - Sion Evans, aged fifty-two - wanted by the police for questioning in the abduction of a French-bred racehorse and a list of other unnamed crimes, had been spotted by a passing tourist running along towards Mignonville, some ten kilometres from Mazerolles. The public were warned not to approach him as he could be dangerous and may have caused the recent death of his partner at L’hommaizé.