‘Always, though, even when she was turned away from me, I felt a tension in her body. An expectation and a dread perhaps. She didn’t move, though, when I began to touch her. Perhaps I’d pull up her top and press my breasts against her warm back. Perhaps I’d slide a hand around her stomach and up to cup her breasts, to squeeze her nipples. She remained still, only responding with the faintest of quivers.
‘In the early days, I used to take out handcuffs and ropes and sex toys for our play and put them away again afterwards, but after a while, they remained out, so whenever the thought came to me, I could grab her wrists and clip her into the cuffs that were permanently attached to the headboard. Often then, I would kiss her on the mouth and matters would get violent for a while as she squirmed and tried to turn away, but I wouldn’t let her.
‘It was important to me that Ivy experienced orgasms at my hands. I’m not sure why, exactly. It wasn’t that I felt it was necessary to be fair. You know, one for her for every one of mine. No, it was something deeper than that. It was about control. I knew that Ivy hated me and wanted to escape my control. For the sake of her brother, she would remain with me and serve me. But if she could have, Ivy would have created a wall against me, deep down inside.
‘Do you understand? There was always – well, ever since our last year at school – a reserve about Ivy. I’d seen her with her real friends and I was jealous of how easy and unguarded she was with them. With me, however, Ivy was quiet and distant. I knew she wanted to preserve some core of herself and keep it away from me. And that’s what giving her orgasms meant. It meant I’d broken down Ivy’s reserves, to reach the intimate core of her being.
‘She’d fight me and squirm away. But with her wrists cuffed and sometimes her ankles too, there was no escape. It might take me an hour, usually only fifteen minutes, but I persisted. With toys, fingers, or my lips, I’d rub and push and lick, over and over and over until at last I felt a proper response. She would become extremely slick and the scent of her sex would fill the room. Then I’d know she was close.
‘Sometimes, at that point, I’d stop, to see if her body strove to find contact with me and sometimes it did. I enjoyed such moments. But in any case, I’d return to what I was doing that was working and eventually, with little gasps, her body would tremble and tighten. She was clever, Ivy, and often would try to fake the orgasm. But there was such a release of moisture with the real thing that I could always tell.
‘I found it better to give her pleasure before taking my own. The disheartening conclusion I came to about this was that Ivy genuinely found it repugnant to serve me sexually, because if I rode her mouth until I came, or made her finger me, it would take a lot longer to get her aroused afterwards. Better to start slowly, by sliding my hands all over her and leaving my own needs for a while.
‘I used to wonder where she went in her thoughts, because they were rarely in my bedroom. Perhaps she fantasized about real lovers, about a Prince Charming who would come and save her. If there had been a good-looking man at the cinema, restaurant or café that day, I’d have watched Ivy carefully, to see if she showed any interest. I was always alert to whether there was eye contact, and sometimes there was. With her fashionable haircut and slender face, Ivy was beautiful and stood out among the good, solid farming stock of Wexford. She literally could turn heads.
‘This was all very well and, in fact, made me feel proud that I owned her. But it also introduced a certain amount of anxiety for me. If ever Ivy got to spend time alone with a man (or, less likely, a woman) of sufficient strength of character, my hold over her would break. In part it was illusion. It worked because she knew me all these years and what I was capable of. But a new voice, advising her, could shatter that illusion. So I wouldn’t let men join our table, which they sometimes offered to do.
‘Did Ivy think about the men she had seen? Sexually, I mean. What did fill her thoughts as her body betrayed her? Sadly, I don’t think she was ever, in the moment of orgasm, thinking about me and what I was doing for her. It wasn’t just that she hated my control of her life; I don’t think Ivy was at all interested in women, sexually, so whatever was happening in our bed connected to her dreams and not the reality. Still, I shouldn’t sound like I’m complaining. At this point I had realised all my ambitions. I had the farm back and I had the girl I was most desirous of in my bed. What more could I want?
‘And yet, there was something missing. It was like something was broken in Ivy. She was lacklustre. We’d get up late, which was unusual for me, being a farm girl. I’d grown up being used to rising soon after the sun. Then, after breakfast, I’d propose some activity and invariably Ivy would say, “I don’t care”, or something like that. I might test her, to see if she secretly might want to meet a man, by suggesting we go to the theatre or somewhere public where she might get to socialize. If she was hiding an interest in doing so, she was very good at it, because it was always the same response. “It’s up to you.”
‘We might go to the beach, but it wasn’t the same without Bonnie. I mean, I like fresh air, the sound of the waves and exercise, but there was no fun. No watching Ivy’s hair swirl around her head as she picked up and threw sticks for Bonnie. Instead it was a trudge, side-by-side, over the sand, until we were done.
‘Or we might go to the cinema. I never really enjoyed the cinema. Unbelievable stuff. The same for theatre. I really found it hard to get engaged. There was one time.’ Amy Philips looked across at me, eyes sparkling. ‘It was a French film. Amélie, maybe. No, that was much later. She had hair like Ivy, Amélie, a rich, black bob. But anyway, we were sitting in the dark and I think that only one other person was there. The good farmers of Wexford are not keen on daytime cinema, nor French films at any time.
‘By happy chance, I was wearing a skirt, so it was easy to pull it up and place Ivy’s hand on my mound. She didn’t resist, but she didn’t volunteer any enthusiasm either. I made her straighten her middle finger and passed the time while she was watching ahead, face flicking pale and white, masturbating against her hand.’ Pausing with a shrug, Philips took a drink of water. ‘But that was it really; cinema for me was generally a bore.
‘We’d often to the library. After all, our evenings in were taken up with reading. And it was there that I first scented danger. One of the librarians was a man. And while he wasn’t much of a man – short, fleshy, out of shape – he wasn’t much older than us and he shared Ivy’s enthusiasm for Russian literature. It annoyed me to hear them chatting about Tolstoy or someone and never would Ivy take my hints and move off. No, she would make a point of not leaving until her little chat with the librarian had run its course. There wasn’t much I could do about that. I had a nuclear button, the threat to her brother and that was fine for the big questions, of Ivy staying with me and serving me in bed. But when it came to little ones, I could hardly threaten to kill her brother over a ten-minute chat with the librarian.
‘Even so, there was something going on between them and I didn’t like it. One rainy day, we were driving into town when I could tell Ivy was anxious. She had to sit on her hands to stop fidgeting. And when I glanced at her, curious, she flushed.
‘“What’s the matter, Ivy?”
‘“Nothing.”
‘I didn’t believe her. When we’d been in the library a while, Ivy began to drift away from me, as though interested in the sports section, which was pathetic. I let her go and found a place where I could watch the counter from between the rows of books. Sure enough, once the male librarian was free, Ivy hurried over to him and handed back her books. As she did so, her cheeks were bright, like a child’s and there was a look of urgency on her face. She said something to the librarian and he looked at the book in his hand curiously.
‘“Oh, is that Anna Karenina?’ As soon as I’d seen Ivy almost run to get to the counter I had set off myself. I reached for the book and with a firm pull, took it out of the hands of the librarian. ‘You can add it to my card,” I said to him. “I haven’t r
ead it yet.”
‘“No need, Amy, we’ve a copy at home.”
‘“Oh, I don’t think so, Ivy Now it was in my grasp, I wasn’t going to let go and Ivy was such a poor liar, she was pretty much trembling all over. I had the confused librarian scan the book on my card and when I got us out of there, we sat in the car, listening to the rain, while I turned the book over and over in my hands. Her lovely mouth was only a thin, pale line, compressed with worry and she looked away, out of the passenger window.
‘“What’s going on, Ivy?” But she didn’t answer me.
‘When I looked inside the book, I didn’t find a letter. That’s what I thought the scene was all about. That Ivy had reached out to this man. No letter. But obviously, something was wrong. Flipping the pages back and forth, I suddenly noticed faint markings in the margins of a cluster of pages. They began at Chapter Four and were just little dots on the left hand side of the text.
‘I’m pretty good with puzzles and it didn’t take me long to see what she’d done. Ivy had put a dot next to the letter you were supposed to read, looking down the margin. It was like an acrostic poem. And when you read the letters in sequence, they said, “Help me please. I’m being blackmailed by Amy Philips. But be careful. She’s dangerous. Don’t go to the police. If you understand this message then write one back to me in Chapter Four of Pride and Prejudice, which I’ll borrow next week. Then I’ll write you a longer message explaining what I need you to do. Please, believe me. This is important. And thank you in advance. Ivy Patterson.”
‘You can imagine the range of emotions that ran through me. A certain amount of rage. After all, this was a betrayal. A lot of sadness, because, despite the obvious signs in her lack of conversation and generally passive demeanour, I had hoped that Ivy was enjoying her relationship with me at some level. That although her conscious mind might be in denial, her unconscious was responding to the orgasms I was giving her.
‘I remembered my mother’s dying words. “Trust no one.” They were very true. I really should not have trusted Ivy at all. She was ready to turn on me as soon as she could. It suddenly occurred to me that I might not be safe from her. Up until that time, I’d never seen Ivy as dangerous. Not like my uncle, or even, possibly, Mike. Mike was a complicated, miserable, troubled young man and might lash out. Ivy? All I had feared from Ivy was that she was capable of killing herself to end her unhappiness. I had never seen her as a person who could bring me grief.
‘Yet, if she could come up with a complex code like this, it showed me that she was capable of planning against me to a great extent. Had it even occurred to her that if I were dead, all her problems would be solved? Every night, when I fell asleep beside her, was I at risk?
‘I started the engine and switched the windscreen wipers on. But I didn’t set off. Instead, to the steady rhythm of the raindrops being swept aside, I said, “Well. That’s your library privileges revoked.” Then I asked her, “What were you going to do, Ivy? What was the plan?”
‘She just shook her head, so I continued, keeping my voice low. “I don’t see that man as a knight in shining armour, coming to rescue you. Do you?” Ivy didn’t answer. “He’s a bit small, for a start. And, to be honest, a bit dull. He wouldn’t have understood your code. You would have been better simply handing him a letter. Even if I’d seen you do it, how would I have got it back from him?
‘“Suppose you did get someone to help you here. And suppose they came to the farm to take you away. And suppose you warned Mike. Do you know how quickly he’d come running to me? I’d ring him. I’d say that I missed him and I missed making him cum. He’d tell me everything you said and we’d both laugh at the idea of my killing Mike. And he’d come here as soon as he could. My new Bonnie.
‘“You are smart, Ivy. You understand your brother almost as well as I do. And you know what I’m saying is true. So your plan would lead to tragedy.”
‘Her face was turned away from me, forehead resting on the window. But I could tell from her ragged breathing and the shudders of her shoulders and back that she was crying.
‘“Give up, Ivy. It’s not so bad here. You just need a project. Take up art or writing.”
‘We sat there, rain pattering on the roof, windscreen wipers marking time, Ivy openly sobbing now. Eventually, I just started the car and eased away from the library. In future, she would have to wait in the vehicle while I went inside.
‘Driving back to the farm, Ivy never said a word and I didn’t say much either. I did warn her though. “I won’t be able to trust you any more, Ivy. From now on, we sleep with the bedroom door locked and the key around my neck.”
‘For a second, Ivy looked at me, surprise and concern registering in her red-lined eyes. “Why?”
What should I say? That I feared her going downstairs for a knife? I didn’t want to inadvertently put into her head a thought that in her innocence, she had not yet conceived.
‘“So, if by some trick you do find a man willing to help you, you won’t be able to slip away and meet him. Remember, Ivy, I’m going to be at your side, always. I’m not going to let you wander unaccompanied around the library or anywhere else. I’ll be more attached to you than your shadow.’
Chapter Twenty-Eight
‘Let’s have a break.’ I stood up, just as Amy Philips was about to launch herself into a new account of her past. She looked disappointed, then sat back.
‘If you like. Will it be a long one? Shall I, we, wait here?’
‘Thirty minutes. You can wait here if you want.’
McCarthy followed me out of the room and then out of the front doors of the station, where I found myself letting out a long breath.
‘Well?’ McCarthy asked.
‘I don’t know. It’s like she’s in my head. Because whenever I start to believe we are wasting our time with all her story-telling, she gives us something worthwhile. Something, at least, that would help us with the jury.’
McCarthy nodded. ‘Like the dog, Bonnie.’
‘Exactly. Jesus. She was pretty much telling us she did the same to the victim, right?’
‘I think she’s playing a game with us.’
I glanced at McCarthy, hoping she had a grasp on how Philips worked, because I certainly didn’t. ‘Go on.’
‘Ah, just, she’s one of those types who think they are smart. Too smart for us.’
‘Maybe she is.’ It was a depressing thought.
‘No, she isn’t that clever really. And if she carries on giving us hints like that, she’ll make a mistake in the end and convict herself.’
‘So you think we should carry on?’
‘You and I should, definitely.’ McCarthy sounded firm on this. ‘But we need someone with tech skills to go after Ivy. Find her digital footprint. Ideally, a phone record.’
‘Right. I’ll get Aisling, Garda Power, to help. But I’m not sure we should continue to let Philips go on at this slow pace. I think we’re missing something important, something that she knows and is hiding by going on and on about the past.’
McCarthy drew a deep breath and rubbed her eyes. ‘I have that feeling too. That we’re just treading water here when we should be somewhere else.’ Her blue eyes were focused on the distant, grey sea. ‘And that somewhere else must surely be the farm.’
‘Again?’ My heart sank.
‘Or,’ McCarthy shrugged, ‘maybe I should go to Fitzalan’s Hotel.’
Astonished, I turned towards McCarthy and saw a hint of a smile. She didn’t say anything, just outwaited me with that half-grin on her face. ‘Go on then, why Fitzalan’s?’
‘Only, Mrs Patterson is staying there. She’s come to arrange to have the body shipped back to England for a funeral.’
‘Ivy and Michael’s mother?’
‘Right.’
All at once, I was filled with energy and enthusiasm. We had another line of enquiry. ‘Stay here.’ I strode back through the doors and told the desk to arrange for Philips to be taken back to her cell. Then
I went out to the car park and drove around the front to pick up McCarthy, who was ready for me.
It was only ten minutes to Fitzalan’s and on the way, McCarthy briefed me. Elizabeth Fitzalan was seventy-five, a widow, a former factory inspector for a biscuit-making multi-national. She’d arrived at Dublin Airport last night and had a taxi take her all the way to Wexford, which would have cost her ten times the air fare.
The young boy on reception called up to her room for us, then, putting the phone down, said, ‘You can go on up. Two-o-six.’
Fitzalan’s was an old-fashioned hotel. Warm carpets, odd little steps and alcoves with comfortable chairs that you might actually want to sit in and read. I much preferred this kind of place to a sterile modern hotel, where all the rooms were identical.
Two-o-six was fairly large, conveniently; certainly it would do for our purposes. The room had three armchairs around a small coffee table. Elizabeth Fitzalan, who had opened the door to us, was small and dressed in an expensive-looking, dark navy suit. Her hair was a white bob and the wrinkles of her face spoke of someone who had lived a life of severity rather than merriment.
‘Come in, officers. Can I make you some tea?’ She gestured to the white plastic kettle on a table by a mirror.
‘No, thank you, Mrs Patterson,’ said McCarthy, with a very charming smile on her face. She was good at this kind of situation. ‘And thanks for giving us your time.’
‘I’m only too pleased. Anything I can do to help put that psychopath behind bars will be a joy.’ There was a grim, resolute look to her that made me think of the stare of a falcon. She gestured towards the table, where we all got comfortable, McCarthy and me taking out our notebooks.
‘When did you last see your son?’ began McCarthy, her voice gentle.
‘He came to visit me, oh, about two months ago.’
‘Did he say he planning to come to Ireland? To see Amy Philips?’
Struggles of Psycho Page 17