by B. A. Paris
Jane floats into my mind. Her face lingers there, her expression as blurred as it was on the day I saw her in the woods and I’m sad that I can barely remember what she looks like. It all seems to have happened so long ago. My silent caller is still around though. During the week, when I’m home alone, I’m aware of the phone ringing at regular intervals throughout the day. Sometimes, through the fog in my brain, I hear Hannah, or Connie, or John, leaving a message on the answering machine. But when a call cuts off before it can be picked up, I know that it’s him.
I’m still ordering things from the shopping channel, except that I’ve upped my game and am now ordering jewellery instead of kitchen gadgets. On Friday, Matthew came home from work, holding another parcel left by the postman on the doorstep and my heart sank at the thought of playing yet another round of guess the contents.
‘That smells like my favourite dish,’ he’d said, smiling, before coming over to kiss me while I tried to work out what I’d ordered.
‘I thought it would be a nice start to the weekend.’
‘Lovely.’ He held up the box. ‘Another gadget for the kitchen?’
‘No,’ I said, hoping it wasn’t.
‘What is it then?’
‘A present.’
‘For me?’
‘No.’
‘Can I look?’
‘If you want.’
He took a pair of scissors and cut open the outer packaging.
‘Knives?’ he asked, drawing out two black flat leather boxes.
‘Why don’t you open them and see?’ I suggested. Suddenly, I knew what they were. ‘Pearls,’ I said. ‘They’re pearls.’
He flipped open the lid of one of the boxes. ‘Very nice.’
‘They’re for Rachel,’ I told him confidently.
‘I thought you’d already bought her some earrings?’
‘These are for Christmas.’
‘We’re only in September, Cass.’
‘There’s nothing wrong in starting early, is there?’
‘No, I suppose not.’ He drew out the bill and gave a low whistle. ‘Since when have you spent four hundred pounds on your friends?’
‘I can do what I like with my money,’ I said defensively, knowing I was right in not telling him about the cottage in Ile de Ré I’d bought for Rachel.
‘Of course you can. So who are the other ones for?’
All I can think is that I must have forgotten I’d ordered them and ordered another set. ‘I thought you could give them to me for my birthday.’
He frowned, less willing to play along with pretence than before. ‘Don’t you already have some?’
‘Not like these,’ I said, hoping a third set wouldn’t turn up.
‘Right.’ I could sense him looking at me curiously. He’s doing that a lot at the moment.
*
The risotto ready, I call Matthew and we sit down to lunch. Just as we’re finishing, there’s a ring at the doorbell. Matthew goes to answer it.
‘You didn’t mention that Rachel was coming,’ he says, bringing her through to the kitchen. Although he smiles, I can tell he’s not overly pleased to see her. I am, but I’m also caught on the hop, because I have no idea if I’ve forgotten that she was meant to be coming or if she’s just dropped in of her own accord.
‘Cass didn’t know, I just thought I’d drop in for a chat,’ she says, coming to my rescue. ‘But if I’m disturbing you, I can always go away again.’ She looks at me questioningly.
‘No, it’s fine,’ I say hurriedly, hating the way Matthew always makes her feel unwelcome. ‘We’ve just finished lunch. Have you eaten or can I get you something?’
‘An espresso would be lovely.’
Although Matthew’s on his feet, he doesn’t move, so I go over to the cupboard and take out some cups.
‘Would you like one, too?’ I ask him.
‘Please.’
I place a cup on the stand and take a capsule from the rack.
‘So, how are you?’ Rachel asks.
‘Fine,’ I say. ‘What about you? How was your trip?’ I go on, keeping it purposefully vague because I can’t remember where she went.
‘Same as usual. Guess what I bought at the airport on the way back?’
I put the capsule into the slot but instead of sliding in it stays sticking out of the top.
‘What?’ I ask, trying to push it in.
‘An Omega watch.’
I take the capsule out and try again, aware of Matthew’s eyes on me. ‘Wow. It must be gorgeous,’ I say. The capsule still won’t go down.
‘It is. I thought I’d treat myself.’
I press down on the capsule, trying to force it in. ‘Dead right,’ I say. ‘You deserve it.’
‘You have to lift the lever first,’ Matthew says quietly.
My face burning, I do as he says and the capsule slips into place.
‘Why don’t I take over?’ he suggests. ‘Maybe you and Rachel would like to sit in the garden. I’ll bring the coffee out.’
‘Thanks,’ I say gratefully.
‘Are you all right?’ Rachel asks, once we’re on the terrace. ‘Maybe I should have phoned first, but I was in Browbury this morning and thought I’d drop in on impulse.’
‘Don’t worry, it’s not you, it’s me,’ I say, making her laugh. ‘I couldn’t remember how to work the coffee machine. First it was the microwave, then the washing machine. Now it’s the coffee machine. Next I’ll be forgetting how to dress myself.’ I pause a moment, steadying myself to make the big announcement. ‘It seems I might have early-onset dementia.’
‘Yes, you told me a couple of weeks ago.’
‘Oh,’ I say, deflated.
‘You haven’t been for the tests yet, have you?’
‘No, not yet.’
‘What about the pills? Are you still taking them?’
‘Yes.’ I lower my voice. ‘But I never take any at weekends because I don’t want Matthew to know how much they affect me. I just pretend to take them and hide them in my drawer.’
She frowns at this. ‘Cass! Surely, if they affect you that much, you shouldn’t be taking them at all! Or at least be taking a smaller dose.’
‘Maybe, but I don’t want to. Without them I wouldn’t make it through the week. They make me forget I’m alone in the house, they make me forget about the phone calls.’
‘Are you still getting them?’
‘On and off.’
She places a hand on my arm. ‘You have to tell the police, Cass.’
I glance up at her. ‘What’s the point? I don’t suppose they’d be able to do anything.’
‘You don’t know that. Maybe they could put a trace on your incoming calls or something. What does Matthew think?’
‘He thinks I’m not getting them any more.’
‘Here comes Matthew with our coffee,’ she interrupts loudly, warning me of his arrival. He puts a cup down in front of her and she looks up at him sweetly. ‘Thank you.’
‘Just shout if you want a refill.’
‘We will.’
She leaves an hour later, offering to come and pick me up the following Friday and take me out for the evening. She knows I don’t trust myself to drive and I hate that I now have to rely on people to take me out and about. The regret I feel for the life I used to have is like a physical pain. But it isn’t dementia that has robbed me of my independence, I realise, though that day may one day come. It’s the guilt and fear that have riddled my every waking moment since I drove past Jane’s car two months ago. It’s guilt and fear that have diminished me. If Jane hadn’t happened, if I hadn’t met her, if she hadn’t been murdered, I would have been able to cope with the news that I have early-onset dementia. I would have faced it head-on and would, at this very moment, be looking at my options instead of spending my days asleep on the sofa.
The realisation of what I’ve become, and why I’ve become as I am, is a massive wake-up call. It snaps me out of my lethargy and makes me de
termined to take some positive action. I think about what I can do to turn my life around, or at least start getting it back on track, and decide to go back to Heston. If anyone can help me in my quest for peace of mind, it has to be Alex, Jane’s husband. I don’t expect him to take away the guilt that I feel because it will always be with me. But he had seemed a kind and compassionate man and if he sees that I’m truly sorry for not stopping to help Jane that night, he might find it in his heart to forgive me. And then maybe, just maybe, I might be able to start forgiving myself. I might even be able to do something about the fear, nurtured oh-so-carefully by my silent caller. I’m not so naïve as to think that all my problems are going to be solved with one trip to Heston. But at least it’s a start.
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21ST
I add the pills that Matthew brought me this morning to the little pile already in my drawer, because if I’m to drive to Heston today I need a clear head. I spend a long time in the shower, letting the water wash over me and when I eventually get out I feel mentally stronger than I have for a long time. Almost reborn. Maybe that’s why, when the phone starts ringing around ten o’clock, I decide to answer it. For a start, I want to check that the calls weren’t just a figment of my imagination and, secondly, I can’t really believe that he would continue to call when I haven’t answered the phone in God knows how long.
The sharp drawing in of breath as I take the call tells me I’ve taken him by surprise and, delighted that I’ve wrong-footed him, I’m able to cope with the silence coming down the line better than before. My breathing, normally shaky with fear, remains even.
‘I’ve missed you.’ The whispered words slide silkily down the line, hitting me like an invisible force. Fear resurfaces, raising bumps on my skin, choking me with its venom. I throw the phone down. It doesn’t mean he’s nearby, I tell myself, trying to regain some of the calm I’d felt earlier. Just because he spoke to you, it doesn’t mean he’s watching you. I take a few breaths, reminding myself that the fact he wasn’t expecting me to answer the phone proves that he doesn’t know my every move. But it’s hard not to feel afraid all over again. What if he decides to pay me a visit, now that he knows I’m back in the land of the living?
I go into the kitchen, my eyes instinctively checking first the window, then the back door. I try the handle; it remains reassuringly unmoveable. No one can get in unless I let them.
I go to make coffee, but remembering the struggles I had with the machine yesterday, I pour myself a glass of milk instead, wondering why my caller chose to speak to me this time when he never has before. Maybe he wanted to destabilise me because, for the first time, he hadn’t been able to sense my fear. I feel a surge of triumph at having changed something fundamental between us. I haven’t exactly brought him out into the open but I’ve made him divulge a little of himself, even if it was only a whisper.
I don’t want to get to Heston too early so I do a little tidying to take my mind off the fact that I’m alone in the house. But my mind won’t settle. I make myself a cup of mint tea, hoping it will calm me, and sit in the kitchen drinking it. Time passes slowly but with a lot of willpower I manage to hang on until eleven and then I leave, putting on the alarm as I go. As I drive through Browbury, I remember the last time I was here, the day I bumped into John, and work out that it must have been about five weeks ago. When I remember how scared I’d been that day because I’d thought that the murderer was in the garden, I feel real anger that someone could instil such fear in me. And where had those five weeks gone? Where had the summer gone?
I arrive in Heston, leave my car in the same road and cross over to the park. There’s no sign of Jane’s husband or the children but I didn’t expect it to be that easy. I don’t want to think about the possibility that he might not come to the park at all, or what I’ll do if he refuses to listen to me, so I sit for a while on an empty bench, enjoying the feel of the late-September sun on my face.
At around twelve-thirty, I make my way to the pub, stopping off at the village shop to buy a newspaper. I order a coffee at the bar and carry it through to the garden. There are a surprising number of people already having lunch there and I feel suddenly conspicuous, not only because I’m alone but also because everyone seems to know each other, or at least be regular customers.
I find a small table under a tree, a little away from everyone, and open the paper. The headlines aren’t very interesting so I turn to the next page. An article with the title WHY HAS NOBODY BEEN ARRESTED? jumps out at me. I don’t have to read it to know it’s about Jane’s murder.
Alongside the article is a photograph of a young woman, a friend of Jane’s, who seems as frustrated as I am by the slowness of the police investigation. ‘Somebody must know who the murderer is,’ she is quoted as saying, a sentiment picked up and chewed over by the reporter. ‘Two months ago, a young woman was brutally murdered,’ the article finishes. ‘Somebody somewhere must know something.’
I close the paper, my stomach churning. As far as I know, the police had stopped appealing for the person who saw Jane alive in her car that night to re-contact them, but this latest article might stir things up again. I’m too wound up to sit, so I leave the pub and start walking down the street in search of Jane’s husband because, now, more than ever, I don’t want to go away empty-handed. I have no idea where he lives, if he lives in the village itself or in the new estate that has been built on its outskirts but, as I pass a row of stone cottages, I see two identical tricycles parked in one of the front gardens. Without giving myself the chance to hesitate I walk up the path and knock on the front door.
I see him checking me out through the window but he takes so long coming to the door that I think he’s not going to open it.
He looks down at me from the doorstep.
‘The tissue lady,’ he says, his voice neither friendly nor unfriendly.
‘Yes,’ I say, gratified that he’s remembered. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you but could I talk to you for a couple of minutes?’
‘Not if you’re a journalist, no.’
I shake my head quickly. ‘I’m not a journalist.’
‘If you’re a medium of some kind, I’m not interested either.’
I smile a little, almost wishing it was the reason I was there. ‘No, nothing like that.’
‘Let me guess – you and Jane go way back and you want to tell me how bad you feel that you lost contact with her.’
I shake my head. ‘Not exactly.’
‘So why do you want to talk to me?’
‘I’m Cass.’
‘Cass?’
‘Yes. I wrote to you a few weeks’ ago. Jane and I had lunch together just before…’ I tail off, not knowing what else to say.
‘Of course!’ A frown crosses his face. ‘Why didn’t you tell me who you were when we bumped into each other in the park?’
‘I don’t know. Probably because I didn’t want you to think I was intruding. I was driving through Heston that day and remembered Jane mentioning the park so I decided to stop. It didn’t occur to me that I might bump in to you.’
‘I seem to spend most of my life there,’ he says, grimacing. ‘The girls never tire of it. They ask to go every day, even when it’s raining.’
‘How are they?’
‘They’re doing really well.’ He opens the door wider. ‘Come in. The girls are asleep so I have a few minutes.’ I follow him through to the sitting room, where toys litter the floor and Jane gazes at me from myriad family photos. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’
‘No, thank you,’ I say, suddenly nervous.
‘You said you wanted to talk to me?’
‘Yes.’ Sudden tears fill my eyes and I grope in my bag for a tissue, angry at myself.
‘Please, sit down. You’ve obviously got something on your mind.’
‘Yes,’ I say again, taking a seat on the sofa.
He pulls up a chair and sits down opposite me. ‘Take your time.’
‘I saw Jane that night,’ I
say, twisting the tissue around my fingers.
‘Yes, I know, at a party. I remember Jane telling me.’
‘No, not that night. The night she was…’ The word ‘murdered’ sticks in my throat. ‘The night she was killed. I was in Blackwater Lane and I drove past her car in the lay-by.’
He doesn’t say anything for so long that I think he’s gone into some kind of shock.
‘Have you told the police?’ he asks eventually.
‘Yes. I’m the person who phoned in to say that she was alive when I saw her.’
‘Did you see anything else?’
‘No, only Jane. But I didn’t know it was her, it was raining too hard for me to make her out, I could see it was a woman but that’s all. I only knew it was Jane after.’
He exhales heavily, and his breath hangs in the air between us. ‘You didn’t see anybody in the car with her?’
‘No. If I had I would have told the police.’
‘So you didn’t stop?’
Unable to meet his eyes, I bow my head. ‘I thought she’d broken down so I pulled in in front of her. I thought she might get out of her car but she didn’t – it was pouring down – so I waited for her to flash her lights or sound her horn to tell me that she needed help and when she didn’t I presumed she’d already called someone and that they were on their way. I know I should have got out and run back to check she was all right but I was too scared, I thought it might be some sort of trap, so I decided that the best thing would be to phone the police or one of the breakdown services as soon as I got home, because I was only a few minutes away, and ask them to go and check on her. But when I got home, something happened that made me forget to phone them. Then, the next morning, when I heard that a young woman had been murdered, I felt – well, I can’t describe how I felt… I couldn’t believe that I’d forgotten to make that phone call… I kept thinking that if I had, she’d still be alive. I felt so guilty that I couldn’t tell anyone, not even my husband, because I thought that if it got out, people would point their finger at me and say that I was to blame for her death because I hadn’t done anything to help her. And they would have been right. And then, when I heard that it was Jane, I felt terrible.’ I swallow down tears. ‘I may not be the murderer but I feel as much to blame for her death as he is.’