by S. E. Lynes
Chapter Thirty
Last Words
One last point, before I lock this whole thing in a drawer and throw away the key. Under Christopher’s bed, behind the box of letters, was his scrapbook. It was full of newspaper clippings, all of them about the Yorkshire Ripper, some photocopied, most actual news reports from various papers, dating from the time Christopher went to university – that is, from the time he knew himself to be adopted. The book bulged like a wallet full of banknotes.
At the back, dated Friday, 3 April 1981, a few months after they caught Peter Sutcliffe and not long before Ben appeared, was another article concerning the murder of a female Leeds University student in 1978. The article said that the police had removed her name from the list of Sutcliffe’s victims. The method of killing was not his and Sutcliffe had not included her name in his confession. According to the report, sexual intercourse had taken place before her death. She had suffered some bruising but there was no forensic evidence to link the victim to Sutcliffe. The woman’s name was Sophie Hampton-Scott. Her body had been found in woodland opposite Oxley Hall, behind Weetwood Lane. She had been strangled.
And I remembered that conversation in the pub, when I asked Christopher what he meant when he said he’d always known.
‘Do you think that feeling came from actual concrete events,’ I said, ‘or was it more of a sixth sense?’
‘No,’ he said, shaking his head, ‘but I could breathe it in the air.’
Nothing tangible, not a single event, but a multitude of little things – chance remarks, sudden silences, glances exchanged between relatives. Call it a sixth sense, call it intuition, call it the accumulation of small moments; in this life there are simply some things that even without proof we know absolutely. And so to this: what I, Phyllis Curtiss, know and what will be buried with me:
When Christopher volunteered to be Adam’s alibi, he was effectively securing his own.
‘I’d always known,’ he used to say. How true those words were; how little I understood them.
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Also by S.E. Lynes
Mother
Valentina
A Letter from S.E. Lynes
Dear Reader,
Thank you so much for taking the time to read Mother. I am thrilled that you did and hope you enjoyed it.
Mother came, as many of my ideas do, from a chance remark. The book is for me about the deep need to belong and to know who we are. I have lived in many different countries, but thanks to growing up in a loving family am fortunate enough to have always known where home is. For Mother I have drawn from all sorts of sources, not least from my hometown, Runcorn, where I lived until I was eighteen and which formed much of who I am.
If you enjoyed Mother, I would be so grateful if you could spare a couple of minutes to write a review. It only needs to be a line or two, and I would really appreciate it! I am always happy to chat via my Twitter account and Facebook author page if you wish to get in touch. Any writer knows that writing can sometimes be a lonely business, so when a reader reaches out and tells me my work has stayed with them or that they loved it, I am truly delighted. I have loved making new friends online through my first novel, Valentina, and hope to make more with Mother.
My next book is well underway, and I hope you will want to read that one too. If you’d like to be the first to hear about my new releases, you can sign up using the link below:
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Best wishes
Susie
Acknowledgements
First of all, thank you to my wonderful editor at Bookouture, Jenny Geras, whose positivity, tact and expertise have been instrumental in getting this manuscript to where it is.
Huge thanks to Stephanie Zia for her generosity, love and encouragement in this new flight – Stephanie, you are an actual angel.
Thanks as always to my co-pilot in this life, Paul Lynes, who read Mother in its rudimentary stages and said, Blimey, I never knew you were so devious. Your love is the air I breathe, my darling, but one more football injury and it’s over between us, all right?
Big thank yous to my MA writing group, headed up by Hope Caton and attended persistently if not consistently by my beloved writing buddies Robin Bell, Catherine Morris and Sam Hanson.
Other readers to thank are Jackie West for early reading and advice, Alison Gaskins for early reading and encouragement, Gail Shaw for a long conversation about Leeds in the late seventies (even if you did freak me out by having all your Christmas shopping done in October), Jayne Farnworth for tips on police procedure over pints and peanuts, Lynda Crellin for a long conversation about adoption practices in the late seventies, Caroline James for plot discussions over yet more pints and Richard Kipping for birth-certificate stuff and things artistic… thank you and big big love, Fleetwood Mac style.
Thank you to my kids, Ali, Maddie and Franci, for returning to me the energy that writing uses up and for sharing funnies at the end of my working day. I am so proud of all three of you, which is totally irrelevant here but these are my acknowledgements so I can write what I like.
Thanks to my creative-writing students at Richmond Adult Community College for all their love and support, for keeping me focused on this important form of self-expression and for making sure I wash my hair, put on normal clothes and get out of the house sometimes.
Thank you to all my family and friends who have supported me so massively by reading my first book, Valentina – thank you for your likes and shares, reviews, word-of-mouth advertising, book clubs and general flag-waving. You have helped create a readership and been a huge source of encouragement on what has been the most extraordinary journey – you know who you are.
Thank you to all the amazing bloggers, too many to mention. Little over a year ago, I had no idea what a book blogger was but now, well, all I have to say is: you rock! Huge thanks to Tracy Fenton, Helen Boyce, Teresa Nikolic and all the admin team and book nuts at TBC for helping me, and many new authors like me, reach readers, without whom I am shouting into the void, and for posting reviews of Valentina. I hope you enjoy this one just as much.
Thank you to Kim Nash for making joining the Bookouture authors so much fun and to Jane Selley for her amazing eagle-eyed copy-editing skills.
Big thanks to Dad, Stephen Ball, who supports me in many background ways and who, when he read my last book, provided the pithy insight: Three months in that cottage and they’ve not even mowed the lawn yet.
Lastly, massive thanks, as ever, to Mum, Catherine Ball, who reads drafts so hot off the keys they are still warm, who makes me feel normal when I think I’m mad and who is prepared to have countless conversations about my work in progress #reallyquiteboring. You are the best. This book is for you.
Published by Bookouture
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An imprint of StoryFire Ltd.
23 Sussex Road, Ickenham, UB10 8PN
United Kingdom
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www.bookouture.com
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ISBN: 978-1-78681-220-9
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Copyright © S.E. Lynes, 2017
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S.E. Lynes has asserted her right to be identified as the author of this work.
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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publishers.
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organiz
ations, places and events other than those clearly in the public domain, are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.