by Kate Helm
*
I travel back to Brighton where I buy a replacement phone and the cheapest second-hand laptop I can find.
Once I’m home, I open the envelope and find the photograph with Pink in the background. It’s the only clue Jeanette hasn’t had access to. For all I know, it’s not a clue at all. Except . . .
When I look up, Pink is there in the flat.
‘What did Jim do to you?’ I ask her. ‘I wish you could tell me.’
I turn the picture over. The date is faint, but it is there, in red ink across the back. 29 May 1979.
I check the list of girls living at Copse View in May. It had a fast turnover, just as Jeanette said – but a few stayed as long as six months. I draw an asterisk next to their names; there are twelve girls in all.
Now I check the dates of the two police visits. I don’t know for sure if those visits are connected to Jim, or the girl I know as Pink. Whether Jim’s father attended for the same reason on both occasions.
But this is the very last thing I can try.
The date of the first visit is 20 February. That narrows it down: now I am left with four girls who were there when the police were called and lived at Copse View when the photo of Pink was taken.
The second police visit was 29 July. I hold my breath as I scan the list of residents with stinging eyes. Three of the girls had left by then. But one remained.
Rosanna Chapman.
I look up, and Pink is smiling at me.
‘Is that you?’
She keeps smiling.
‘Hello, Rosanna. It’s nice to know your real name at long last.’
63
My sense of triumph doesn’t last. When I search, there is no trace of Rosanna online. It shouldn’t be a surprise – so much time has passed. She’s probably married. Hopefully she’s left Ashdean behind her.
But there is news of my father. A new email has arrived.
Dear Ms Sage,
She’s respecting my new identity. I suppose it’s not uncommon in her world.
Thank you for your recent email. I appreciate the contact after so many years of silence must have been shocking. I’m sorry to have to break the news that your father is unwell, and the prognosis is terminal. Although his specialists are unable to give a precise timetable, they’re talking months rather than years.
He’s dying. My father is dying.
He is not yet hospitalised and is able to live a relatively normal life within the prison system.
As I understand it, he has never attempted to contact you before. Nor has he cooperated with any suggestions of applying for parole, although he is no longer considered a risk. However, recently, during conversations with the pastor, he expressed the desire to speak to you. I would not want to put any pressure on you. However, if you are undecided about whether you ever would like to communicate with him, time is not on our side.
He’s dying soon.
My reflection in the laptop screen is fuzzy enough for me to see him in it. The last of the Ross clan, with our fair hair and our wide-set eyes.
Please do call me to discuss it if you wish. If you do decide you’d like to see him, I have some discretion to process a visiting order quickly, given the circumstances.
I am numb.
Do I ever want to see my father again?
If I’d been asked that a year ago, there’s no way I’d have considered it.
But now I realise why I emailed the prison officer: I want to make him suffer. Just like Jim Fielding, my father thought he had the right to take life or spare it, on a whim.
My father, at least, is no longer a danger. I click reply to the email. I will go to see him, if only to take away any shred of comfort he might feel from ‘saving’ me.
And as for Jim? Jeanette’s theory about Robert blackmailing him makes sense, though it also makes O’Neill less of an innocent. He must have known what Jim had done when he took those photos at Copse View, and when he used them as his own get-out-of-jail card.
But it doesn’t mean he should have died.
With him gone, the only hope of finding out what really happened at Copse View in 1979 lies with this Rosanna. There must be a reason she is in my life, and Charlie too. I feel as though I am so close. And I have money. Now I have a name, there are other ways to find her.
Jim thought I was weak, and for a while, I was. But it’s different now: no past, no future. I can devote the present to making a difference for the first, and last, time.
*
I hang up four times before I let my call to Neena connect.
I am such a bloody coward.
‘George? George, are you OK?’
Oli will have told her about his visit, but I trust him not to have told her about my vision loss.
‘Yes. I’m sorry I’ve been avoiding you. I felt so terrible about the sketch.’
‘Oh, screw that. I was pissed off for twenty-four hours but then I got worried. I can’t believe I didn’t spot you were burning out. You’re my mate. I should have known.’
‘I’m pretty good at keeping stuff hidden when I want.’
‘True. Listen, do you want me to come to Brighton? I could come this weekend. Bring the kids. Mind you, that’d be enough to send you right off the deep end. So I’ll come alone. Except for our mutual friend, gin. How’s that?’
She’s such a whirlwind, I almost say yes. But then I pull back.
‘Not this weekend, but soon. Actually, I called to ask a favour. I’ve been using my time off to do some admin and I’m owed some money by a private client, who has gone AWOL. I know you have all sorts of nefarious freelancers working for you. I wonder if you could give me the details of a private detective?’
‘Oh.’ She sounds a little hurt. ‘Oh, yeah. OK. How nefarious do you want to go? On a scale of one to ten?’
‘Ten. It’s quite a lot of money.’
She laughs. ‘Fair dos. The best one I know for people-finding is refreshingly unscrupulous. I’ll text you his email address.’ She pauses. ‘Next weekend, though? Or any night during the week? I don’t want to lose you as a friend, whatever’s happened with work.’
‘Me neither.’
When the call ends, I stare at her name on the screen until it vanishes. I wish she hadn’t forgiven me. It makes it so much harder to live with knowing I will never see her again.
*
I email the private detective, and within a couple of hours, he emails me back, asking for details of the person, and spelling out his fees. I reply with what little I know about Rosanna, warning him she might have tried to hide her identity.
The reply comes later in the evening.
Pretty much impossible to really disappear these days, if you know where to look. Usually get a hit on someone this age within a couple of working days. As soon as you send my retainer, I’ll get cracking.
I transfer £300. It’s a long shot, but what else do I have to spend my money on?
Pink is with me this evening. I can’t think of her as Rosanna yet but her presence is reassuring, as though she wants me to know I am on the right track.
*
All weekend, I hear nothing. But on Monday my new mobile rings, an unfamiliar number flashing on the screen. The private detective must have news.
When I answer, there’s a long wait before someone speaks.
‘Is that Georgia Sage? This is Daniel Fielding.’
I’m so shocked, it takes me a few moments to find the words to respond.
‘Daniel? Are you all right?’
‘You want to talk to me about my dad.’
‘I didn’t expect—’
‘Expect me to call? Me neither. Life’s full of surprises, right? I didn’t expect to still be alive.’
He sounds different: still belligerent, but also more animated.
‘Can you talk safely?’ I remember that prisoners aren’t allowed mobiles inside. ‘Did you borrow someone’s phone?’
‘I’m out.’
‘What?�
��
‘Free at last.’ His voice is sarcastic. ‘Once I was all patched up, they sped things along. Apparently I’m not a danger to society anymore.’
I wonder whether Jim knew this at our last sitting, when I lied about his son being up for parole.
‘Are you OK, Daniel?’
‘Yeah. But it’s different. Everything is different.’
‘I bet.’
I close my eyes, imagining how the world looks to him. All the things I’ve done and seen, since he was sent to prison: the technology, the world events.
But I won’t feel sorry for him.
I don’t know for sure he was innocent of arson. Murder. Jeanette said he was there, after all.
‘I need to meet you, Daniel. Could we—’
‘Were you lying, Georgia? About your dad, what he did? Because I looked up your name and there was nothing connecting you to any murder case. Except the ones you draw.’
‘I changed my name,’ I said.
In the call’s background, I hear city sounds. Wherever he is now must be overwhelming after the isolation of the jail on the moors.
‘Prove it.’
I hate the idea of telling anyone who I was, but I understand this is a test. And I also understand why a man with a father like Jim would find it hard to trust anyone.
‘My name was Suzanne Ross. We lived in Somerset. It happened . . . twenty years ago. You’ll find me if you look for that.’
There’s a pause.
‘I still don’t get why you give a shit about us.’
‘For what it’s worth, I care about justice. About people like Jim paying for what they’ve done.’
I can hear his breath.
Don’t hang up, Daniel.
‘I’ll call you when I’ve checked you out, Suzanne. If that’s who you really are.’
He ends the call. I sit, looking at the phone. I have no idea if I just spoke to a murderer or an innocent man.
I used to think I could tell the difference.
64
There’ve been three periods in my life when I’ve woken up thinking about creating, and fallen asleep with the brush in my hand. The first was when I fell in love with oil paint, aged eleven.
The second came when I went to art school as Georgia, trying to lose my old self in my new identity.
And now, I paint as I wait for the endgame. Hours turn into a day, then two. I hear nothing from Daniel. When I summon up the nerve to call the number he rang me on, no one answers. But the private detective has emailed to tell me he has leads on Pink – on Rosanna. Enough for him to request another payment. And the prison officer has arranged a visiting order for me to see my father next week.
I’ve found my own way to prepare for that. Yesterday, I went to the art shop in the Lanes and bought new paints: oils, from the same budget range I used when I was eleven. I recognised them from the colours, because the print on the tubes is now impossible to read.
I spread them thickly on the palette – I don’t need to worry about being sparing – and I purposely breathe in the fumes, making myself remember, so I feel angrier and angrier, ready for when I see my father.
And they fuel my anger against Jim, too. Anything to give me the energy to pursue this to the bitter end.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. It’s a video text. I click on it, and a baby appears. My vision makes it blurry, but as the video plays, I hear a gurgle that turns into a laugh.
It’s Millie. And Oli has sent a message to go with it:
I know you’re feeling low. I am here for you, and so is your prospective goddaughter. Please say yes.
I play the clip again, trying to make out more detail. The walls in the background are painted primrose yellow. The nursery was once my art room, where I kept my sketches, my own private library of hate and suspicion. Thank God I never had a child with Oli. I don’t deserve one.
I text back:
Thank you, but I’m not at all godly, never mind worthy. But I love the video. Millie will break hearts. Love G x
I pour some wine, and stand by the window, looking out at the dark, out-of-focus square. It’s only six weeks since I stood here and saw Charlie for the first time.
That feels like another person’s life – a carefree one. But it was only ever that on the surface. I was kidding myself. Georgia, Suzanne – what’s the difference?
Shame is like oil paint: it doesn’t fade with time.
*
On Wednesday afternoon, the private detective sends me an email marked urgent. I open it to find the address, email and phone number of Rosanna Chapman. Pink is still alive, and living with a partner, a son and a daughter. Surprisingly, she still lives in the forest, though not in Ashdean.
This completes my work for you. My invoice is attached.
I settle the last part of his bill. It’s cost me £600 of my father’s blood money for a few details with the power to shatter someone’s life.
While Pink sits in my armchair by the window, bathed in the early evening sunlight, I try to work out the best way to approach Rosanna.
Visiting her – Neena would call it doorstepping – is the one way to be sure I will get a response. But it may not be the one I want. I imagine someone turning up at my address to ask me about what my father did.
I’d slam the door in their face.
No.
An email seems too . . . casual, but a letter – on her doormat, the shocking reminder of something she wanted to forget – feels almost as intrusive as a visit. And a phone call out of the blue perhaps the worst of both worlds.
If I email her, at least I know it’ll go to her only, and won’t involve her family.
I draft something in a notebook. Pink is dozing in the sun, and I try to picture the woman she has become.
‘What do you care about, Rosanna?’ I say. ‘What could persuade you to revisit what might have been a terrible time in your life?’
I can only answer for myself: justice.
And I begin to write from the heart, with none of the sense of manipulation I used in my letter to Daniel.
Dear Rosanna,
I need your help and I know what I am asking isn’t easy. But I believe you were assaulted when you were at the Copse View residential care home – or if you weren’t, then you might know who was.
So many years have passed that perhaps you’ve tried to forget it. But I promise you, this still matters and there are people out there who still care about justice, who want wrongs to be righted. So if there’s even the tiniest part of you that still remembers and hates what was taken from you, then please get in touch. There could be ways to speak out but stay anonymous, if that is what it takes.
And it’s even more important now, because he’s about to marry again. There have been other girls. There may be more.
It’s not too late to make things right.
I hit send before I change my mind. When I reread the email, it occurs to me I’m writing as much to myself as I am to Rosanna.
*
When I see Daniel’s mobile number appear on my screen later, I am almost scared to answer it.
Before I can say a word, he whispers:
‘I believe you. You really are Suzanne.’
‘Hello, Daniel.’
‘Your dad’s as big of a shit as mine is, right? Worse. To kill his own kid as well as his wife.’
He sounds drunk or stoned. I guess if I’d spent thirteen years in jail, I’d spend a lot of my time getting wrecked myself.
‘Daniel, is everything OK?’
‘Yeah, yeah. Life’s hunky-dory. I’m gonna get him, the fucker. Tomorrow. Like you said.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘In your letter – you said I can’t let him get away with it.’
‘That’s not what I meant—’
He laughs to himself.
‘He’s not gonna see me coming. But I’ll make sure he knows it was me before it’s all over. I’ll be the last person he ever sees
when the knife goes in.’
No.
‘This isn’t what you want, Daniel. What about justice? Making him face up to what he’s done?’
Daniel scoffs. ‘Bullshit. Won’t happen. He’s bulletproof.’
‘That’s not true – I’m working on getting evidence. You can help me.’
‘Fuck that. I want him to be as scared as my mum was.’
His speech is getting more slurred, and I am afraid he might drop the phone, or end the call before I can calm him down.
Maybe it is just the drink talking, but what if it’s not?
‘Daniel, where are you?’
‘Night shelter in Gloucester kicked me out a few days ago for being pissed, so I decided to come home.’
It takes me a moment to realise where he means.
‘Ashdean?’
‘It’s a shithole, but you know what they say. Home is where the heart is.’
The probability of him being serious just increased by a frightening degree.
‘You’ve only just got free, Daniel,’ I say, in the calmest voice I can manage. ‘Think this through. You don’t want to end up inside again.’
‘I’m done thinking.’
I try to work out what to do. It’s too late to get a train to Ashdean but I could maybe get a cab. It’d cost hundreds, but who cares?
‘Where are you sleeping tonight?’
He laughs. ‘Take a guess. I’ll give you a clue. It’s very grand, though it has seen better days. It’s got a lovely view. And I feel extra close to my ma.’
Shit.
‘You’re at Copse View?’
‘And guess what happens here tomorrow?’
Before I can reply, he says, ‘Daddy is giving the press a special tour and showing them all the amazing things he’s going to do here. I’m going to give them an even better story.’
‘Daniel, think it through—’
‘It’s all I’ve thought about for days. Years.’
‘I want you to tell me everything. Tonight. If you kill him, they’ll put you away again. Say you were mad. But if you talk to me now, I can speak for you. Tell the press what your father did to deserve it.’
‘You’re not gonna talk me out of it.’