by Thorne Moore
Denise had accused him, and Angela had set the police dogs on to him. Who prompted them to do it, I wonder?
I stood in the middle of the allotments, staring at the railway line, the anger in me growing stronger by the minute. Wasn’t Janice’s death enough for her?
A man emerged from his greenhouse and carefully padlocked the door, eying me warily. I might be feeling sane, but two days in a van and a few agonising hours of running my brain through a sieve didn’t leave me looking sane. I don’t blame him for locking up. He wasn’t to know I didn’t want to steal his tomatoes.
I returned to the van, walking gingerly on the eggshells of the past, afraid that the clarity and my understanding of all that had happened might begin to disintegrate at any moment. I was alert for that sense of disintegration, because I knew it would be lurking there somewhere, not far below the surface. It would get me sooner or later, but it mustn’t be sooner if I could help it.
I drove back the way I’d come, along the foot of the downs. Over the humpback canal bridge. The place where she’d suggested I kill myself. Because, of course, that’s what she’d been doing. I should have realised, because she’d done it before.
She’s done it that last time I’d seen her in 1966. When my parents were packing up to leave Lyford, and wringing their hands over me, and Hilary was refusing to speak to me because I was responsible for ruining her life and taking her away from her friends. I didn’t understand that that was what I was doing. I didn’t realise that my parents were facing the wrath of their neighbours and an end to all their comfort, for the crime of having a daughter who’d so maliciously and wilfully foiled the police hunt for a child killer.
I’d been aware of that wrath at work elsewhere. I’d seen stones and worse thrown at the Dexters’ house over the years. From the back of a police Jaguar, as I was being taken away for questioning, I’d heard the mob turning on Mr Knight. Now, deprived of a lynching, the bestial snarling settled on my parents. Not on me, because I wasn’t visible. I’d been hauled out a few times to be interviewed by the police or to see doctors, but other than that, I stayed in my room, in my bed, hiding from everyone and everything. No one seriously expected me to go back to school. Everything would be all right, my parents thought – we could all start afresh, horrors forgotten, if we just moved to another town, another factory, another school.
It was the day before we left that Serena came to call.
*
‘Karen. Come on now, pull those covers down. Sit up, please. Look who’s come to see you. Serena. Your friend. Isn’t that kind of her?’
I try to pull them back, but the blankets are dragged from me, by hands that are really itching to slap me, though they’re stroking my head instead, pretending to be loving.
Serena is standing by my mother, smiling sweetly, and I am sick with fear.
‘I’ll leave you to talk,’ says my mother, softly, as if I’m a sick child.
I scream and back up tight against the headboard.
She snaps. ‘Now stop it! Don’t be such a silly girl. Please, Karen, just be nice for once! Serena’s come specially to see you, so behave yourself.’
‘It’s all right, Mrs Rothwell,’ says Serena. ‘I’ll look after her. Won’t I, Karen?’
‘If only you’d just made friends with nice girls like Serena,’ says my mother, sounding as if she’s near to tears too, as she hurries from the room.
Serena looks at me. She’s smiling. I want to turn away, to face the wall, but if I do, what might she do? She is my friend, she looks after me and I am petrified of her.
Serena pulls up a chair to sit beside me. ‘You should have done as I told you, Karen. Everyone is ever so cross with you. Daddy says he’d like to wring your neck because you won’t tell him what you saw. I told you what to say. It would all have been all right if you’d done what I told you.’ She sighs sadly, reaching out to smooth my hair, even though I flinch away. ‘Now everyone knows you killed Janice.’
‘I didn’t!’
‘Oh Karen. You know you did, really. It was because the spirit ordered it, so of course you had to do it. I just helped, because I didn’t want Janice to hurt you, but you know you did it, really.’
She’s smiling, stroking my cheek with her hand. With her nails. Gently up. Then down and the nails begin to dig in. I am paralysed as they dig into my cheek. She is watching as if she’s really curious to know how deep she can dig before she draws blood.
‘It must be horrible for you, having everyone know you killed her.’ Her nails scrape up again..’Your mummy and daddy think it too. I heard them whisper. They don’t like to say so in front of you, because perhaps they’re a bit afraid of you, but they were whispering that they know you did it. They’re worried you might kill Hilary too. Would you, Karen? I suppose now you’ve killed Janice it would be much easier to kill someone else. That’s what would scare me, if I’d done it. If I thought I might kill my own sister. I can’t imagine how horrible it is, having killed your friend. If I killed my friend, I don’t know what I’d do.’ She’s drawn her hand away at last. She’s looking at her nails. ‘I think I’d just jump in front of a car or something. Or out of a window maybe. Yes, I think that’s what I’d do. I don’t know that I could go on living if I’d killed a friend. Because any day the police might catch me and hang me.’
She’s picked up my bear and she’s hugging him. Then she holds him at arm’s length. It’s like she’s talking to him instead of me. ‘They tie you up when they hang you, so you can’t run or anything, and you can scream and scream but they don’t care. They tie a rope round your neck, like this.’ She’s got the belt from my dressing gown and she’s wrapped it round my bear’s neck. ‘Then they open a trapdoor and you drop and the rope goes tight round your throat and you die! And they watch and clap their hands.’
My bear is swinging, choking, and she watches, smiling. I lunge for him, to rescue him, but she snatches him away.
‘I wouldn’t like them to hang me. I think I’d rather anything than that. I’d rather jump. Wouldn’t you, Karen? That’s what I’d do, if I were you.’
I scream, again and again, till I can’t breathe or see.
I can hear my mother, racing up the stairs. Serena is out there, at the top, waiting for her.
‘I’m sorry, Mrs Rothwell, I can’t make her stop. I only wanted to cheer her up.’
‘I know you did, Serena. You’re a very nice, thoughtful girl and she doesn’t deserve such nice friends.’
My mother’s coming in, alone, and my screams quieten.
‘What’s the matter with you?’ she demands, staring down at me. ‘Why me? What have I done to deserve this?’ She picks up my bear from the floor and throws him on the bed. ‘Why can’t you be more like Serena?’
*
I drove on, up the steep road to the top of the downs, over into the woodland, to Thorpeshall. A lorry was half blocking the entrance to Braxton Lane. I expect I could have squeezed past it safely enough, but I could picture myself scraping it – I still hadn’t confidently grasped the dimensions of Malcolm’s van. I didn’t want to risk being diverted, at this moment of moments, by some irate driver demanding my insurance details. So I parked on the green, opposite the Black Swan, and walked the quarter mile down Braxton Lane, to the bend where Serena’s bungalow nestled.
It was mid-afternoon. Gary the painter had gone, no van on the gravel drive, no ladder against the wall. The woodwork was all complete, smart and glistening. No neighbour in the adjoining gardens either, to note down my arrival for the Watch committee.
Someone was definitely at home. I caught the flicker of a TV screen in Serena’s living room. If I knocked, I’d be summoning her from her daytime viewing…
I actually, momentarily, hesitated at the thought of inconveniencing her. It wasn’t so much concern for her as the impulse for flight, which had been deep-rooted in me for three decades. I hesitated, then all the anger resurfaced and I brushed the urge to flee aside.
I knocked on the door, then rang the bell, then knocked again. Enough. I stood waiting.
The murmur of the TV grew louder as an inner door opened. A wail of sirens – some police drama. Then the front door opened and Serena was standing there, glass in one hand, the other holding the door. Motionless in mid-gesture, as if we were playing Grandmother’s Footsteps. She looked flushed, almost excited as she opened the door, but when her eyes fixed on me, they became utterly expressionless. Stunned.
‘Why?’ I asked.
— 22 —
The gravel crunched underfoot. It rang in my ears. I looked down at my feet, staggering through it, but I couldn’t focus. All I could see and smell and feel was the blood. I was splattered in it, from head to knees. It blackened my blouse. It smeared my hands. It clung in congealing globules to my hair.
I swayed like a drunken woman, but I was out of her garden, into the lane, and the further the horror was behind me, the more the urge to scream subsided. I could begin to breathe again. How far did I need to go? At any moment, one of the neighbours would look out and see a Halloween horror lurching down the road. They’d call the police, and that would be that. I’d be arrested. It was fine. It was all right. It was time I was called to answer, for Janice, if nothing else.
Perhaps I could just sit here on the verge, and wait for the police to come. But no, the abattoir scene was too close, churning my stomach. I looked at my hand. What was I holding? A towel, of course. A blood-streaked towel. I wiped my face with it, feeling the blood smear, then I stumbled on, waiting for the shouts, the screams, the busybodies who’d be rushing out to tackle me at any moment.
No one came.
No one tackled me. No one looked out and gasped, as I staggered down Braxton Lane. The beady eyes of the Neighbourhood Watch must have been taking a siesta, because no one peered out of their cottages around Thorpeshall green, or glanced out of the Black Swan. They were in there, some of them. Again and again, I caught the flicker of TV screens, but no one appeared, no one challenged me, no car drove past.
So I got in the van, dropped the bloody towel out of sight in the back, switched on the engine and drove away.
I drove home.
I drove to escape the blood, not the retribution. I had no clear idea of what I was going to do. My sanity, which had lasted this long, was hanging by a thread, pleading to go into shutdown. I’d think about what to do. Later. For now, I just wanted to get away from the blood.
If… So many ifs. If someone had seen me in the village, I’d never have got as far as the van. If I hadn’t filled up with petrol the night before, I’d never have made it home without having to stop at a garage. If it hadn’t been pitch dark when I arrived, that couple walking their dog in the street would have noticed that my clothes and face were not just dirty brown. But nobody saw, nobody realised.
Back in my garden flat, I stripped off all my clothes, placed them carefully in a plastic carrier bag so that the police could collect them, then I showered. I was in the shower for God knows how long. An hour, maybe. The problem of the electricity bill was for another day. All I wanted now was to be clean, to get it off my skin, from between my fingers, out of my hair. To have the sickening smell out of my nose.
Then I took my medication and I went to bed. I woke late, with madness sitting by my pillow, waiting to be invited in. Waiting to carry me off to some fantasy world that would block out all the horror and anxiety of this one. I knew it was only a matter of time and I panicked at the thought of losing what I’d only just recovered. The truth.
I went rummaging for paper and pencil, and I started drawing. The bridge, the pipe, the culvert, the trees. The concrete block. I had to get it down on paper before it fled from me. Drawing was the only thing I had excelled at in school, back in those early years of innocence when school had been something you went to every day and did lessons and played with friends. Miss Carmel praised my dogs and cars and buttercups. It was the only teacher’s praise I could remember. And my heart had burned with unendurable pleasure, when Serena had marvelled at my horse, with legs that bent in the right directions. I was the one who could draw anything. So I drew now.
Nothing sweet and marvellous about these drawings. No buttercups. No prancing ponies. They were black and intense.
They kept me occupied until a knock on the door brought me back to my present surroundings. I realised I still hadn’t got dressed. No time. I grabbed a dressing gown and wrapped it round me, ready to greet the police with some small decency. I’d been waiting for them.
I opened the door and it wasn’t the police. It was Malcolm.
‘Thank God,’ he said.
Of course it was Malcolm. I’d left the van in full view on Thorpeshall green, and though it was smudged with road grime and the paintwork was scratched and faded, the words Gem’s Books were still clearly visible. The police would have traced Malcolm easily and he’d have brought them to me.
There were shadows of people behind him, down the passage, in the bright light of the road. They’d be coming down now. Except that they didn’t. They just walked past. They didn’t even glance down the passage. Not police, just two passersby, who flitted out of my vision without even registering my existence. Then there was just Malcolm, looking worried and grave and shaking his head, but in relief, not accusation.
‘I saw the van, so I knew you must be back. Thank God. I didn’t know what to do. I’ve been worrying myself sick, wondering whether to contact Charlotte or go to the police.’
‘Didn’t you report the van stolen, when I took it?’ I stood back to let him in. When had I taken it? A year ago. No, it was only on Sunday. And this was Wednesday. ‘I thought you’d go to the police. I stole your money too. I used your card. Sorry. I needed petrol.’
He didn’t hug me, exactly. He rubbed my arms. ‘It’s all right. I’m just relieved you’re safe and sound. I had an inkling you might be having another meltdown. I should never have let you go. Thank God, you’re okay.’
‘Yes. So far. Sorry I didn’t come into work.’ Midweek, I thought. ‘Why aren’t you at work? Who’s minding the shop?’
‘Never mind that. It’s quiet. I shut up for the day, thought I’d come and check here again. So what happened to you, Karen? Where did you vanish to?’ His gaze had fallen on my drawings. He was frowning down on them, trying to figure out their significance, which, of course, he couldn’t.
I picked them up. ‘I wanted to make sure I didn’t forget again. What happened in 1966. How my friend, Janice, died.’
‘You’ve been back to Lyford? I thought it might be that.’
‘Lyford and Hay and Brecon. Sorry about the petrol.’
‘Never mind that. Did it do the trick? Did you find what you were looking for?’
‘Oh yes.’ I sat down. ‘I found it.’ I looked up and found him studying me anxiously. Looking for the usual signs, I suppose. I wasn’t sure if he could see them or not.
‘Good,’ he said, still thoughtful. ‘Have you eaten today? You haven’t, have you? Have you eaten at all since you left?’
‘Oh you’d be surprised. I had a huge breakfast. Yesterday. Yes, I haven’t eaten since then. I suppose I should. Do you want some breakfast? Not sure what I’ve got. The bread will be stale by now.’
‘All right.’ He looked pleased that I was compliant and that there was something he could do. ‘A bit late for breakfast, but I’ll nip out and get us something for lunch. And you get dressed, yes?’
‘Yes, all right.’ While he was gone, I dug out clean clothes. Fresh everything. It was one o’clock. I had no idea it was that late. I switched the radio on. By now, Serena’s death would probably be on the news. A mention, perhaps of the police search for a blood-soaked killer.
There was no mention of Serena. There was no mention of anything except the one item of news, which drowned out all else.
It was Wednesday, September 12th, 2001.
I listened. Then I switched on the television. The same news. Yesterday’s ne
ws, but they couldn’t let go. I’d had a compulsion to draw the scene of Janice’s murder, in order to keep it real. The TV companies and news agencies, it seemed, had the same compulsion to play and replay and replay and replay the impossible and yet unarguable collapse of the World Trade Centre towers.
Malcolm returned with sandwiches, and found me staring at the screen.
‘This happened yesterday?’
‘Yes. Yesterday afternoon. You didn’t know?’
‘No.’ Yesterday afternoon, I’d been confronting Serena. She’d been watching the TV when I’d arrived. Smoke and screams and panic. I’d assumed it was a thriller movie. She’d turned it off as soon as I’d followed her into the room.
‘I didn’t know.’ Once more, on the screen, in a seething storm of all-enveloping dust and despair, a tower sank into ruin before our eyes. And then another.
Serena sinking into a pool of blood. No choking dust surrounding her. Just blood, endless blood.
‘Terrorists,’ said Malcolm. ‘Almost impossible to believe.’
‘No. Terror is very believable.’
‘Yes?’ He looked at me anxiously, then switched the television off. ‘Don’t look at that. It’s too horrible. Tell me, Karen. What happened to Janice?’