Little Girls Tell Tales

by Rachel Bennett

  ‘Why did you pretend you never heard of Simone?’ I asked.

  ‘Because that family is bad news.’ Patrick straightened up in his seat. He smelled musty from the fumes of the quadbike. ‘I barely got away from Florrie with my balls intact. The last thing I wanted to do was stir up the past.’

  ‘Cora told me about you,’ Dallin said. ‘You strung her Aunt Florence along for two years. You just kept telling her of course you would leave your wife. She changed her name for you.’

  ‘Exactly. You see what I mean? Batshit crazy. What sort of woman does that? And for the record, I never promised her anything.’

  ‘It wasn’t even your real name! You lied to her about everything.’

  ‘What about Simone?’ I asked. ‘What did you promise her?’

  Patrick held his hands up briefly in annoyance. ‘I never did anything with Simone. I didn’t touch her, I didn’t kiss her, I didn’t lead her on. Everything she thought was going on was entirely in her head.’

  ‘So why did she tell her family you were her boyfriend?’

  ‘To wind them up, probably. Or to hurt me. She never liked me. She probably thought it was the quickest way to get rid of me, to get her dad to chase me off.’ Patrick touched a finger to his forehead. ‘You see that scar? That’s where her dad glassed me. Bunch of psychos in that family.’ He winced then, as if the vitriol had a physical effect on him.

  ‘That’s not the way Cora tells it,’ I said.

  ‘Look, I met Cora and Simone a few times at parties. All I did was a bit of flirting, before I realised who she was and how old she was.’ Patrick’s expression twisted in disgust. ‘Soon as I realised, I walked away.’ He winced again. ‘Her family overreacted. There was never anything between me and Simone. Do you have any idea what they threatened me with? You’d have thought I’d started World War Three.’

  ‘Where’s Cora now?’ I asked.

  Dallin said, ‘We’ve already called the police. They’re on their way.’

  Patrick’s expression paled. He held up a defensive hand. ‘I don’t know anything about Cora. I’ve not seen her since she got here.’

  ‘Lucky for you,’ Dallin said. ‘She would’ve remembered you straight off.’

  ‘I bet. Her family still curses my name, right?’

  ‘With good reason, the way I hear it.’

  Patrick washed a hand over his face. He looked more than a little green. ‘I don’t know how I could’ve been any clearer with Florrie,’ he said. ‘We told each other a hundred times it wasn’t anything serious. We were just having fun. She said that’s all she wanted. God knows I never lied to her. She knew from minute one that I was married. Then all of a sudden she started talking about how things would be different after I left Nicole.’ He wiped his forehead was a shaky hand. ‘I told her that would never happen. But it was like she was hearing something different. I honest to God never meant to hurt her. She started acting crazy.’ He covered his eyes with his hand. ‘That business with changing her surname. She sprung it on me as a surprise. Said it was an anniversary present.’ He grimaced. ‘I realised right then that I had to break things off.’

  ‘Was that before or after you started seeing Simone?’ Dallin asked.

  Patrick glared at us. ‘I told you, I spoke to her a few times, at her dad’s house. She followed me round trying to cadge cigarettes off me. She was fun, but she was also fifteen. I’m not stupid.’

  ‘Cora showed me the letter you sent to Simone,’ Dallin said.

  Patrick paled further. He pressed his lips together tightly.

  I’d walked around the table to the shoe rack by the back door. Two pairs of upside down boots stood on the rack. The larger pair had mud on them. The tread pattern was the same wavy pattern I’d seen in the mud behind Cora’s tent.

  ‘Why did you ransack Cora’s tent?’ I asked.

  Patrick slumped in his seat. He shoved aside the half-eaten plate of curry so he could put his head in his hands again. ‘I didn’t believe it was definitely her,’ he said. ‘I needed to make myself sure.’

  ‘Did Simone come here?’ I asked.

  It looked for a moment like Patrick wouldn’t answer. ‘I’ve always wondered how she knew where to find me,’ he said at length.

  ‘So, it’s true then? She came here?’

  ‘She tracked me down,’ he said. ‘God knows how she managed it. I never told anyone where me and Nicole lived. Didn’t even tell them my proper name. I was worried about what her aunt might do with the information.’ He flicked another glare at Dallin. ‘Turned out I was right to be worried. I had to block Florrie’s number in the end.’

  I said, ‘Florrie was, presumably, a grown-ass woman who can make her own mistakes. Simone was a child. Do you expect us to believe she somehow tracked you down when no one else could?’

  ‘I’m not saying I was hiding. I’ve kept the same name and the same address since I came back here. If it was that big a deal, anyone could’ve found me, if they’d cared that much.’ Patrick lifted his shoulders in a shrug. His face was getting paler by the minute. ‘Apparently, Simone cared enough. She turned up on my doorstep one night. Thank God Nicole was away.’ His hands were shaking again. ‘I told Simone to get lost. Slammed the door in her face. She was telling me she had no place to go, nowhere to sleep the night … she stayed out there for an hour, crying and shouting. I thought I’d have to call the police.’

  ‘Let me guess.’ Dallin’s lips twisted. ‘You took pity on her and let her stay the night. Out of the goodness of your heart.’

  Patrick glared at him. ‘You don’t have to tell me I was crazy. Of course I shouldn’t have let her in the house. Obviously it was a sure-fire way to make a bad situation worse.’

  ‘How long did it take you to figure that out?’

  ‘Not long. In the morning she came downstairs wearing Nicole’s dressing gown. Pretending it was her house, her life.’ Patrick wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘I tried to throw her out. She threatened to call Nicole and tell her everything. She’d got hold of my phone and gone through my contacts. She found – a while ago, alright, when I’d gone through a bad patch, I started thinking I should split with Nicole. Not because of Simone or anyone else. Just because, because all marriages are a strain sometimes, and sometimes you think about leaving. That’s just the way it goes. I got as far as writing a note for Nicole. I never finished it. I shoved it away in the bottom of a drawer and forgot about it. Simone must’ve stayed up all night to go through everything I owned, because she found the note. It was a nightmare.’

  ‘I’m sure it must’ve been terrible for you,’ I said.

  ‘She kept shouting and screaming.’ Patrick’s gaze was unfocused as he relived the incident. A chill went down my back. ‘All day. She’d play nice and talk sensible, then an hour later she’d be all teeth and nails again. I couldn’t make her leave. I couldn’t say anything to shut her up.’

  ‘What did you do?’ I asked quietly. I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear the answer.

  ‘I went for a walk.’

  Dallin let out an incredulous laugh. ‘You went for a walk,’ he repeated.

  ‘I wasn’t gonna stand there and let her scream abuse at me. You can’t deal with kids when they’re like that. So, yeah, I walked out. Simone stayed in the house. I figured I could sit in the pub for a few hours until she calmed down.’

  ‘And what if she’d called Nicole? What then?’

  ‘Wasn’t going to happen. Simone was all drama. If she’d called Nicole, she would’ve had nothing to bargain with. Nothing to stop me throwing her out.’ Patrick struggled to refocus his eyes. ‘I didn’t get as far as the pub. Opal was having some kind of party in her back garden. She was friends with whats-her-name … Eloise’s mum. I think Eloise was there as well. She was a sweet girl when she was little.’

  Had he been drinking? His concentration was wandering. When he lifted his gaze to look at me, his eyes were red.

  ‘Opal used to have people round all
the time. She would deck out the whole garden. Drinks, and lanterns sitting on the back wall, and Opal sitting there with a bunch of people, the lot of them laughing at God knows what. Couple of kids as well.’ His baleful gaze went to Dallin. ‘You were there. Doubt you remember. You were just a little squirt back then. Opal sent you off to bed after I arrived.’

  ‘What about Simone?’ I asked. I was certain we were getting off topic. ‘What happened with her?’

  ‘I stayed for a few drinks. Cheaper than the pub, isn’t it?’ Patrick attempted a grin, but it came out lopsided. ‘Then Nicole showed up.’

  ‘Nicole? I thought she—’

  ‘Yeah. So did I. She wasn’t supposed to be back for three weeks. But something fell through—’ Patrick gestured with a weak hand. ‘I forget. God, it was so long ago. But, there she was. She’d gone to the house. Planned to surprise me. Found Simone instead.’

  I glanced at Dallin. Patrick looked more than just ill – he looked awful. ‘Is he …?’ I started to ask, but Patrick wasn’t done talking.

  ‘Nicole came to Opal’s house and found me. We – you can imagine how it went. I don’t—’ He shook his head. ‘She picked up one of those decorative lamps. Full of oil, or kerosene, or something like that. Winged it straight at my head. Missed me, just. It hit the tree instead. I’d been telling Opal for a year that the tree was dead and needed to be chopped down. She wouldn’t hear of it. Turned out I was right. When the lamp hit the tree, the oil went up like whoosh, and the whole tree was on fire. Twenty foot high. Flames all up the side of it.’ He closed his eyes as he relieved the memory. ‘The fire brigade … I spent an hour talking to them with Opal. She was worried the whole house would burn down.’

  I glanced at Dallin. He was frowning as he tried to reconcile his own memories of that night.

  ‘When I got home, Nicole was gone,’ Patrick said. ‘Simone too. Nicole came back a week later. We patched things up. And I never saw Simone again. Thank God.’ He covered his face with both hands. ‘I thought I’d buried all this years ago.’

  If Patrick’s story was true, Nicole could’ve been the last person to see Simone alive. ‘Where’s Nicole now?’ I asked.

  ‘Now?’ Patrick seemed surprised by the question. ‘She’s gone into Ramsey to visit Opal. Left me dinner.’ He made a vague gesture at the curry. ‘She’ll be back soon.’

  ‘Call her,’ I said.

  Patrick gave a slow blink. He didn’t look capable of speaking, let along making a phone call. ‘I just spoke to her,’ he said. He nodded at the phone next to him. ‘She’s in Ramsey. Like I said.’

  Dallin walked to the other side of the kitchen and snatched up the landline extension. A list of important numbers was written in sharpie on a sheet of paper pinned to the fridge. Dallin quickly found Nicole’s number.

  ‘I don’t think she’s answering,’ he said as he listened to it ring.

  I felt so helpless. Cora was out there somewhere, and if she was safe she would’ve definitely contacted us. Even if her phone was dead, she would’ve found a way to get a message to us …

  I used my own phone to try Cora. ‘Cora’s phone’s still switched off.’

  ‘Can’t you trace a phone?’ Dallin asked. ‘Like … triangulate it, or something?’

  ‘I’m assuming from your tone that you have zero idea of the type of technology that involves. Wait.’ He’d made me remember something. ‘Cora’s got a GPS. She said the battery had run out but – I don’t know if there’s a way to trace it?’ I dug in my pocket for the note Cora had left me. ‘Cora told me to call this number if I needed—’

  ‘Oh Christ, is that her half-brother?’ Dallin grimaced. ‘Jason? I’ve spoken to that guy. He’s a right knob. Here, give me the number, I’ll call him.’

  I gave it to him, then went into the hallway so I could hear myself think.

  I took out my phone and called Mum. I put a finger in my other ear and stepped into the front room so I could hear the phone ringing on the end of the line.

  I was almost ready to give up when Mum answered. ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hi, it’s me. Rosalie.’

  ‘Hello, pumpkin. Everything okay? You said you’d call back in ten minutes.’

  I’d completely forgotten that. ‘I just wanted to check, is Nicole there?’

  ‘Nicole? No … no, she’s not here. Why would she be?’

  ‘Was she there earlier? Have you seen her today?’

  ‘No, no. I haven’t seen her since … oh, Tuesday last week, I think? She borrowed a couple of books from me.’

  I closed my eyes. ‘Mum, do you remember the night the tree burned down in your garden?’

  ‘The tree? Yes, I remember. Terrible. I was so scared the whole house would catch light.’

  ‘You told people it was struck by lightning.’

  ‘Well.’ Mum paused. ‘It was a lot of years ago. I don’t remember as well as I used to.’

  ‘Were you having a party that night? Did you have friends in the garden?’

  Mum let out a small sigh. ‘Who’s been telling you stories?’

  ‘Patrick. He was at your house that night, wasn’t he? There was a party in the garden, and Nicole showed up unexpectedly. She and Patrick argued. She threw a lamp and it set fire to the tree.’

  ‘Well, it seems like you know all the relevant details already. I don’t know what else you want from me.’

  ‘Is it true? Why did you say the tree was hit by lightning?’

  ‘Because that’s what I’ve always told Dallin. He was frightened half out of his wits that night. I certainly wasn’t about to make things worse by telling him the fire was started by one of my friends, by accident or not.’

  I thought of Dallin as a child, when he’d stayed at my house, sheltering under the blankets every time there was a thunderstorm. Mum might’ve been trying to protect him from the knowledge that grownups sometimes did stupid, irresponsible things, but in return she’d given him a pretty healthy fear of lightning.

  ‘What else happened?’ I asked. ‘Did you speak to Nicole after she set fire to our tree?’

  ‘Oh … not that night, no. But she came round the next day to apologise. It was a terrible thing that’d happened to her.’

  ‘Did she tell you what it was? What Patrick did?’

  ‘Not the details, no.’ I could almost hear her lips pursed prissily. ‘I wasn’t going to pry if she didn’t want to talk. I know she came home and found another woman in her house. A teenager. Her niece, she told me.’

  ‘Simone,’ I said. ‘Cora’s sister.’ Patrick’s sort-of niece, I realised. That was what Nicole had meant.

  ‘I never saw her myself. Well, I was never introduced, shall we say. But I saw her at a distance, when I was driving past. She was sitting on the front doorstep of Nicole’s house, smoking a cigarette. In fact, I thought she was Nicole at first, because she was wearing one of her dressing gowns.’

  ‘What did Nicole do when she found Simone at her house?’

  ‘Once she got past the initial shock, I think she felt quite sorry for the poor girl. Patrick had obviously been spinning the girl a tale, telling her he would leave Nicole for her.’ Mum’s voice was thin with disgust, and for the first time I realised the real reason why she’d never liked Patrick. ‘Nicole told me the girl was upset, in tears, with a big ugly bruise on her cheek. Awful. Nicole gave the poor girl a torch and some money, and showed her the path that led to the main road. Given the circumstances, it was more than anyone would expect Nicole to do.’

  The coldness I’d felt down my back spread out over my middle and into my stomach. ‘The path to the main road,’ I repeated. ‘The one that goes through the curraghs?’

  ‘Well, I don’t know, pumpkin. You’d have to ask Nicole, I suppose. She might remember.’

  ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Thank you. I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?’

  When I opened my eyes, I found myself looking at a folded piece of paper on the mantlepiece. It was wedged behind a small bronze
ornament shaped like a hare. The mantlepiece was a lot emptier than mine, with only one ornament, one carriage clock, and a pair of matching narrow glass vases containing two carnations each. It didn’t look like the sort of mantle where Nicole or Patrick would store random bits of paper. Whoever had left it there intended it to be seen as soon as someone walked into the front room.

  I plucked the folded sheet of paper off the mantlepiece. The crease was sharp and crisp.

  Inside, in handwriting that’d pushed so hard on the paper it’d left an imprint on the outside, it said, ‘Nicole, I’ve tried to make things work out, but we both know it’ll be easier if I go—’

  In the kitchen, Dallin called for me.

  ‘It’s Cora!’ he yelled. ‘He’s done it. Her brother found her GPS.’

  Chapter 34

  I almost left without Dallin because he took so long coming out of the house. I turned around in the stupidly narrow road. By the time I was facing the right way, Dallin was jogging down the path from Nicole’s house. I pulled away before he had his door all the way closed.

  ‘Where are we going?’ he asked. He had one of Cora’s maps unfolded in his lap. ‘How do we get to that place?’

  It’d taken just a few seconds for an internet search to turn the string of GPS coordinates into a location. Smeale beach, less than ten minutes’ drive to the north. I’d driven up there just the day before with Cora to visit Lenny’s house.

  ‘I know the way,’ I said.

  ‘I want to know where it is.’

  ‘I don’t need you to navigate.’

  Angrily, Dallin shoved the map into the passenger footwell. ‘What the hell point are these maps anyway?’ he asked. ‘Cora’s been mooning over them for weeks, and what have they told her? Nothing.’

  We drove north at speed, but there was no way to go directly from where we were to where we wanted to be. I had to wind my way through the narrow, twisting roads, with the headlights throwing glaring light up onto the hedgerows on each side. The rain was pelting down. Thick puddles had formed at the side of the roads. Several times I didn’t see them in time and ploughed into the water, throwing up waves on either side.