Intrusion: A Novel

by Mary McCluskey

  “No. You don’t have to come, Mags. I know you’re busy.”

  “Oh, it’s fine. I can take a couple of days off.”

  Kat took a breath.

  “I might go down first, meet up with you later. I’ve a key to the old cottage near Wystandean.”

  Maggie turned around, the little metal jug in her hand. The machine hissed behind her.

  “What old cottage?”

  “The old gatehouse. Sarah’s cottage. She gave me a key.”

  Maggie regarded her sister, a small frown furrowing her forehead.

  “How could she just give you a key?”

  “It was when we were at her Malibu place.”

  “You actually went to that woman’s house?”

  “She’s Scott’s client, Maggie,” Kat said.

  “So what? Come on, Kat!”

  Kat heard something in her sister’s voice that she had not heard for many years. Even when Maggie was a child, anger had brought her close to tears.

  “Why would she want you to go to her cottage?” Maggie asked.

  “She said it helped her, was healing. After her husband died. I used to go there before, years ago. It’s a beautiful place.”

  “And this is not a beautiful place?” Maggie asked.

  Maggie turned back to the machine. Her shoulders were rigid and she gave a hard sigh. Kat regretted mentioning the Sussex cottage so soon.

  “Maggie, please.”

  Maggie turned to face her. She was hurt, obviously, that her sister was leaving, but there was something else in her expression, and Kat realized, with a shock, that it was fear.

  “Whenever Sarah Cherrington gives something, she wants something back,” Maggie said. “You know that, Kat. I can’t imagine why she would lend you her cottage. Unless she’s going to borrow something of yours.”

  “She’s just trying to help.”

  “She does not ever try to help. She manipulates. She controls.”

  “She thought I would want to be alone. To think about things. She’s right.”

  “Alone?” Maggie cried. “You don’t need to be alone. That’s the last bloody thing you need. You need people around you, people who care about you. She’s bloody insane, is what she is. And so are you, Kat. So are you.”

  Maggie’s voice broke, and she turned quickly and walked out of the kitchen. Kat followed.

  “Mags, please. I’ll just spend a day or two down there. Walk on the beach, on the Downs.”

  “You can walk here.”

  “Look, later on you can visit me there if you like. We can hike.”

  “I wouldn’t set foot in that woman’s house. Remember what she did to Sven? To my wedding? And remember what she called me, the night before I got married? A lumpen great cow, that’s what. At three in the morning on my wedding day. Remember?”

  Kat remembered arriving in Rugby after stumbling upon Sarah and Sven. Maggie had been in their bedroom, hanging up her wedding gown. She had turned, excited, and taken one look at Kat’s tearstained face before fear crossed her own.

  “Oh my God, what’s happened? Tell me. Tell me.”

  “Sarah Cherrington and Sven—” was all Kat could say.

  Maggie stared at her, disbelieving.

  “No. Not Sven.”

  “I just saw them. I don’t think he’ll be here tomorrow, Maggie. He won’t be best man. I don’t think he’ll come.”

  Maggie rushed to her sister, held her shoulders.

  “I didn’t think he even liked her,” said Kat, crying hard.

  “Oh shit. We should kill that bitch.”

  “It takes two, Maggie. Sven was . . . touching her.”

  “We should still kill her.”

  Sarah had arrived at their home at three in the morning, throwing stones at the bedroom window. Kat, in a restless sleep, had woken to find Maggie already up.

  “That Sarah person is actually here,” Maggie said, pulling on her robe. “Right outside our bloody house. I’ll deal with her.”

  “Maggie, just ignore her.”

  “Ignore her? Are you barmy, Kat? She’ll wake the whole house. You want Dad to go down there? Jesus. She should be put away. You stay here.”

  Maggie hurried downstairs. Kat heard their murmuring voices, and curious, frightened, she pressed hard against the window and listened. She could hear Sarah sobbing.

  “I just want to say sorry to Kat, that’s all. Sorry, sorry.”

  “You’re drunk,” said Maggie. “Who’s in the car? Is Sven with you? Where is he?”

  Kat peered out at this. Sven wasn’t with Sarah, surely? But it was Dick Hawkinson, a friend from university; she recognized his old VW, the bearded face looking out.

  “A friend. He drove me. I just want to tell Kat—” Sarah began.

  Maggie interrupted her at once. Her voice, still quiet, sounded hoarse with anger.

  “Get yourself out of here now, Sarah-bloody-Cherrington,” she said. “Or I will kill you with my own bare hands. And if I see you again near my home or my sister, I will punch that pretty little face of yours. You are an evil witch. An evil, bad person, and you bring pain to people wherever you go.”

  Sarah had backed away up the path, staring, amazed, at Maggie. The shy, blushing Watt sister, the quiet one, had turned into a demon of fury.

  “And don’t you dare turn up tomorrow,” snapped Maggie. “I don’t want you at my wedding.”

  Sarah had recovered enough to turn at this, and her voice rang clear and loud.

  “I’ve no intention of coming to your wedding,” she said. “Why would I want to? To see a lumpen great cow like you in a white wedding dress? You’re a fucking joke.”

  Sarah said nothing more. She climbed unsteadily into the VW, and they drove away.

  “Maggie, it’s the cottage I want to see,” Kat said now. “And walk the Downs, and along the beach. Sarah won’t be there. She doesn’t even know I’m in England.”

  Maggie shook her head.

  “You are going alone to a cottage in the middle of nowhere, and you think it makes sense? The way you feel right now?”

  “Yes,” said Kat.

  “You’ll give me the address?”

  “I’m not sure of the actual address,” Kat said. “I know where the cottage is, though. I remember. I’ll call you when I know the address. And maybe in a couple of days, you could come?”

  Maggie, her face troubled, studied her sister.

  “Mags, I love you—you know that,” Kat said. “If anybody has helped me, it’s you. But I just want to hike and think. And remember.”

  “Remember?” Maggie said. She was still unsure, but this was emotional territory she did not understand, grief she had never experienced, and Kat saw confusion in her sister’s face.

  “Yes.”

  “For God’s sake, Kat,” said Maggie, sighing. “I wish you wouldn’t. I think it’s bloody stupid. But damn—be bloody stupid. I can’t stop you.”

  Kat moved forward to hug her sister, but there was still so much unspoken and she felt as if a chasm had opened between them. Maggie, too soon, turned away from her and returned to the kitchen.

  TWENTY-THREE

  The cottage looked exactly as Kat remembered it, exactly like its reproduction in Malibu: a bleached-wood floor, a few Chinese rugs, a long sofa of soft cream linen with periwinkle cushions.

  The place was uncluttered. A few prints, including a Mary Cassatt and a Renoir, decorated the white-plaster walls. And yes, there was the cobalt-blue bowl, now empty of apples. The windows were wide, with wooden shutters painted a soft blue. When Kat opened them, salty sea air whooshed into the room. The view of the sea filled the entire window; gulls swooped into the surf. On the horizon, Kat could see boats heading toward the Brighton Marina. She stood for a few minutes, simply staring at the view, before turning to explore the rest of the place.

  Only the kitchen looked different, larger. It had obviously been remodeled. She found a microwave, a fridge, and a cupboard stacked with staples: l
ong-life milk, tea, coffee, and a variety of cans.

  A fire in the fireplace was set but not lit. Kat took one of the long, thick matches and lit it, and immediately, the flames brightened and burnished the room with gold. She remembered sitting by the fireplace with Sarah, waiting for the call from Helen that would summon them to dinner at Lansdowne. In the large bedroom—the bedroom that had been Sarah’s—the bed was already made up, sheets turned down, towels laid out. It was as if this cottage was always ready for visitors, or for Sarah.

  Kat took a can of baked beans from the cupboard and a variety of cheeses and crackers, and setting it all out on thick pottery plates, she settled down in front of her now-blazing fire. It was so quiet. There was no sound but the sea, no lights but the fishing boats out there. The edginess she had felt in Los Angeles, the pain and disappointment, had faded, leaving only a strange emptiness. But she did not feel lonely. Chris, she wondered, did you come here with me? She felt the tightening in her chest that she had previously recognized as the ache of loss or grief, but it had changed slightly. It felt warmer, some warmth spreading across her chest.

  “See how nice it is here, Chris,” she said aloud, just in case. Who is to know if the dead hear us? she considered. Or whether God exists, or if there is life afterward. Who has the answers?

  After dinner, Kat wondered if she should call her sister, just to reassure her. She pulled out her cell phone, saw a flashing light indicating that the battery was low, and remembered that her charger still sat on the dresser in Los Angeles. Damn. She looked around for a landline. The phone was not visible in the den, or the sitting room, or in the kitchen, either. She looked in the smaller bedroom, and then, with mounting puzzlement, she returned to the larger bedroom to check again. Distracted for a moment, Kat looked at the framed print on the wall—Rothko’s Violet, Green and Red. The same print Kat had hung in the Birmingham apartment. She remembered Scott’s words about Sarah needing to replicate things. It was true. Even here.

  Kat shook her head and continued her search for the phone. After five minutes, she began to figure out the answer to a question she had never thought to ask. There was no phone in this cottage. She bit her lip. Well, that solved that problem. She would go to bed instead.

  When Kat woke, at dawn, she heard the sound of the sea and the frantic squawking of gulls. It was cold in the cottage, the fire long out, and a mist of vapor fogged the windows. Kat dressed quickly, warmly, for her walk to the village.

  The air smelled of damp grass and undergrowth as Kat moved briskly along the path from the cottage, hesitating at the lane that led to the big house. The road had a sharp bend, so she had to stride up the hill for a few yards to see clearly, but she was curious about the home Sarah had described as “hideous”—the house that had replaced Lansdowne. She paused on the curve; the driveway now led straight and steeply to the house on the hill, a modern structure, with a wide building alongside it, a garage for the owner’s collection of cars. One of the garage doors was open. Kat could see the glint of a Jaguar. A black compact was parked in the driveway. She studied the house: not hideous, certainly, but all angles and glass and lacking the charm and elegance of Lansdowne. After a few moments, she turned back to the empty lane. She could taste salt in the wind. There was no sidewalk, so she kept to the edge of the road, but only one flatbed truck trundled past, the driver tooting his horn to warn her.

  The village was little changed: a small Saxon church, the haberdashery, and the neat lawn of the village square, with its carefully manicured borders. The timbered pub, though, looked closed, a new “For Sale” sign nailed to one of the beams.

  Kat decided that she would walk toward Wystandean and then circle back through the next village. An hour into her hike, she found herself outside Elmwood Hall, the school from which the young Sarah had been expelled. Kat tried to imagine Sarah here at that age. The girls she could see playing hockey looked about fourteen years old. Sarah had been fourteen when they first met, with that thick braid down her back. But these girls seemed younger, sweeter, with their pink, raw cheeks, their bright, clear voices.

  It was midafternoon by the time she returned from Wystandean, choosing the cliff path back to the cottage. It felt freezing near the cliffs; the wind had a biting edge to it, so Kat pulled the neck of her sweater up around her mouth and tied her scarf tighter. The Channel was choppy, the water a gunmetal gray, edged with white foam. To the east, she could see the chalk headland of Beachy Head, high on the list of the world’s suicide spots.

  She stood on the edge of the cliff staring at the water, studying the rock formations. Years ago, Sarah had shown her this place. Sarah’s young friend Joanna had jumped to her death from here. It would be simple enough, Kat thought: the rocks below were jagged, hard, and a long way down. Instantly. You will die instantly, she told herself. And be with Chris. And if not with Chris, there will be nothing. Our little life is rounded with a sleep.

  Kat moved to the edge, thinking hard. This must not be an impulsive thing. She must think about it carefully. If she were to do it, then it must be a considered decision. It must be the right decision. It occurred to Kat that this did not frighten her, or even disturb her, this option to end her life. It was simply that: an option. It was something she could do now, or later. Or not do at all.

  She inspected the sloping bank to the lower rocks. A better place would be fifty yards farther north, where the rocks were sharper, spiking in a circle. It was an interesting rockscape, with a maelstrom in the center: swirling, turbulent circles of water, where a body could be lost, possibly sucked down into the cavernous dark. But that would leave Scott endlessly searching for her. Maggie and Paul, too, forever scanning the surface of the water. No. Better the simple dive into the Channel; her body would wash up, eventually, with the tide. She walked to the promontory, stood at the edge, and looked down. Yes. Yes, this would do. This would be a good place. She would not need the pills.

  Kat stood still, biting at her thumbnail. What would one think before the water took over, spinning a body swiftly into that dark void? What was Virginia Woolf thinking when, not so far from here, she walked from her house to the riverbank, put down her walking stick, and filled her pockets with stones? Something similar to the thoughts I have now, Kat concluded. That it is time for it to be over. It is simply time for the pain to be over.

  At the edge of Kat’s consciousness was the certainty that she would come back to this. And when the time was right, she must write two letters: one to her sister and one to her husband. She must not leave them wondering and searching. They had talked of healing, Maggie and Scott, but Kat knew that this was not why she had come to Sussex. She did not believe that healing was possible. I am broken, Kat thought, in some deep, unfixable place. And possibly Scott is, too. Perhaps he can find a way back. I thought I had found a way. A new baby. A new beginning. But there is no way back for me now.

  The sound of twigs crackling underfoot jarred Kat so severely that she jumped. She turned. A shadow moved near the trees on the far side of the path. Kat waited, holding her breath. The shadow stepped out into the light. Sarah. For a moment, Kat thought that she was imagining it, that the image she saw was only in her mind. Sarah smiled.

  “Hello, Kat,” she said softly.

  Kat, too stunned to reply, simply stared, wondering how long Sarah had been there, watching her, hidden in the shadows.

  “Sorry to startle you,” Sarah said. “I thought you might be up here.”

  Kat stepped away from the cliff edge. “I didn’t expect—”

  “I did try to call. Scott said you were in England. I hoped you’d be at the cottage. Cell phone reception is abysmal there and you didn’t bother to plug in a phone. Why didn’t you collect the phone from Mrs. Evans?”

  “I didn’t think—” Kat said, bewildered. “You’re here for a vacation?” she asked, unsure of how to word the questions spinning in her head. It was Sarah’s cottage, after all.

  “Only for a day or two,” said Sara
h. “I thought I’d rest here before taking on the big city. I have meetings in London.”

  She smiled at Kat’s unsure expression.

  “Don’t worry, Kat. I’ll be in the other room. I won’t get in your way. You can stay in the big bedroom. I see you’ve made yourself nice and cozy in there. Ignore me if you like.”

  Kat swallowed. Ignore Sarah? She was not so easily ignored.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Inside the cottage, evidence of Sarah’s presence was everywhere. A sweater had been thrown onto a chair; a scarf snaked across the kitchen counter. A white phone had been plugged into an outlet to the right of the fireplace, and Sarah’s laptop was open on a small table beside it. Sarah had lit the fire; the coals glowed in the dim light. Two bottles of red wine had been placed on the dining table.

  Kat took off her coat and stood with it draped over her arm, like a hospital visitor.

  “I’m going to have a bath,” she said. “I’m frozen to the bone.”

  Sarah had thrown off her jacket and taken one of the seats by the fire. She stretched her hands toward the flames to warm them.

  “I bet you are. That’s a bitter wind. But hurry. I asked Mrs. Evans to cook her coq au vin. And we have two bottles of excellent Bordeaux.”

  Sarah’s green eyes gleamed with reflected light from the fire and what appeared to be pleasure and anticipation for the evening ahead.

  “Go have your bath and we’ll have a drink.”

  “I’m glad we have a phone,” Kat said. “I need to make a call.”

  “I wouldn’t call Scott just yet. A small legal crisis in LA—he’ll be tied up in meetings.”

  “I’ll call later.”

  Kat stood, waiting, until Sarah reached out, unplugged the telephone, and handed it to her.

  “There’s a phone outlet to the left of the dresser. And please, Kat,” she added, in a coaxing tone. “Don’t look so put out. I don’t mean to be a bore. I rather thought you might enjoy this. For old times’ sake.”

  Kat smiled faintly and escaped into the bedroom. She saw that the book she had left open on the bed was now closed and had been placed on the bedside table. The closet door was ajar. Sarah had been looking around, of course, snooping through clothes and papers. She used to do the same thing years ago, when they shared an apartment. Nothing was out of bounds for her, not private diaries, not personal letters. Strangely, this snooping did not bother Kat now, though it used to infuriate her. There was nothing private here. Sarah’s curiosity was simply an irritant.