The Sweetest Poison

by Jane Renshaw

  After dwaaming and dozing through the day, she found she couldn’t sleep when night came. She lay on her side, on her back, on her front. She tried to force her mind to think of practical things: what sort of job she’d look for in Edinburgh; where she might live; what she’d say to Mum and Lionel tomorrow.

  She closed her eyes.

  Had he watched her while she slept? Moir? Rob?

  Don’t think about it.

  London. Another bed, and another man.

  A man who had come upon her on a dark road, and crept into her shadow, and carried her off to Corrachree. And when she came back –

  When she came back, she was nae use to naebody.

  Practical things. Practical things.

  She was going to have to persuade Uncle Jim to get a cleaner, and someone to come in and cook him a decent meal at least once a day. Someone to help on the farm.

  To do the heavy work. The lifting. To manhandle the beasts... Jostling and barging... Big thick tongues and strings of saliva... The smell of them... The byre... The byre at the Parks, and the calfies...

  Horses, not calfies.

  Horses, galloping.

  She had to hide. She couldn’t outrun them. Galloping horses, bells jingling on their harnesses. Three of them – four, five – and on their backs... instead of faces there was just blackness, and their hands were reaching for her, stretching, their thin fingers twining in her hair –

  She jolted awake, her whole body tense under the covers.

  The Sith.

  First the Ghillie Dhu, and now the Sith. Oh God! She laughed, shakily, and stretched out a hand to the bedside lamp.

  And froze.

  She could still hear it. The tuneful sound of little bells.

  She got out of bed and padded to the window and edged inside the curtain. Crouching, keeping her head below the level of the sill, she eased up the window’s bottom section.

  The nutty smell of ripe barley came drifting in.

  And the tinkling of bells.

  Could it be something loose in the wind – a chain, or pieces of rusty metal chittering against each other? Wind chimes? Was it likely that Uncle Jim had wind chimes?

  The sound was moving. Coming closer.

  She looked over the sill. In the light of the moon she could make out the steading, the byre, the shapes of Uncle Jim’s old pick-up and Stan – but nothing moving.

  What was it?

  Where was it?

  A jaunty jingling. Getting louder and louder. And she realised that she couldn’t see what it was because it was right under her. Moving against the wall of the house. To see it she’d have to put her head out of the window –

  Instead she shot away from it on her bottom, crawled to the door and out onto the landing, jumped to her feet and then she was at Uncle Jim’s door, knocking and saying his name, and he was opening it, wisps of hair sticking up in a halo around his head.

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘Can you hear it?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘There’s someone outside.’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Someone – moving around in the yard.’

  At the window she shushed him. But the sound had stopped.

  ‘What was it you heard, Hel’nie?’

  ‘It sounded like – bells. Someone jingling little bells.’

  She couldn’t see his face in the dark. ‘Well. I’ll let Fly and Ben out to have a yowf. You get back to bed. There’s naebody coming in about – that pair’d have the arse off them soon enough.’

  As Fly and Ben barked and yelped in the yard below, she rummaged in her bag for her mobile, and the piece of paper on which she’d written down the number of the local police station. But she had no bars. No reception. She’d have to use the landline downstairs.

  With her foot on the first step she stopped.

  What was she going to say?

  It’s an emergency – send a squad car – I think I heard bells.

  Ridiculous.

  Just like everything else.

  Everything he’d done – from dodging in front of her in the street, to worming his way into her life, to following her up here and jingling bells under her window – they were things nobody would believe. Nobody would believe that Rob Beattie, a murderer supposedly on the run, would do any of those things.

  She went slowly back to her room.

  She was remembering the riddle he’d made up, the riddle he’d told her the night before he’d attacked her and killed Suzanne.

  I am the dagger in the night...

  Outside the dogs were still barking, but it was a general We’re here, this is ours, keep off kind of noise – not the purposeful, snarling sound they’d be making if they’d actually found someone out there.

  He’d gone. By the time the police got here it would be too late anyway.

  39

  ‘You’re looking better!’ was the first thing Fiona said when she arrived the next morning, swinging a colourful rectangular shopping bag instead of her doctor’s case.

  Helen smiled from the pillows, dabbing her nose with a soggy tissue. ‘I bet you say that to all the patients.’

  ‘Nope – I’ve just been telling your uncle that some fresh fruit and vegetables would do wonders for his digestion. I’ve told him to get some decent food in. Meanwhile...’ She perched on the bed and delved into the bag. ‘I thought you might like your own supplies up here.’ There was a big thermos, a box of oatcakes, a bag of nuts and raisins, a tupperware box with something inside, some Babybel cheeses and some fruit – a bunch of grapes, dusky purple, three apples and two fat peaches. ‘There’s iced water in the thermos.’

  Like she was a heroine in a costume drama, visiting the sick and needy with a basket on her arm. Fiona would have made a perfect Regency heroine, all sparkling eyes and pert remarks.

  ‘Fiona, this is – so kind of you. You’ll have to let me pay you.’ Helen reached for her handbag.

  ‘Oh poof!’ Fiona set the plate down on the bedside cabinet and started putting the fruit on it. ‘Don’t be daft.’

  ‘Thank you.’ She closed her hand on her purse. Under it were the photographs of Moir. She pulled them out. ‘Fiona – these are – could you have a look at these and tell me what you think?’

  She laid them on the bedspread between them: Moir at the beach at Yellowcraigs, squinting into the sun, hair blown half across his face; Moir in the flat –

  ‘Who’s this?’

  Helen reached for a fresh tissue. ‘Do you recognise him?’

  ‘No. Should I?’ Fiona picked up one of the photos – the one of Moir in the kitchen, turning away from the camera, laughing. ‘He looks a bit like –’

  Helen waited.

  And waited.

  ‘Like who?’ she prompted.

  Fiona was looking at her as if she was an unexploded bomb. ‘I was going to say... oh Helen, I was going to say Rob Beattie, but –’

  ‘Do you think it’s him?’

  ‘Oh God! Helen! No. Where did –’

  ‘Is it him?’

  She was frowning at the one of Moir admiring the frontage of Falkland Palace – the best one, showing his whole face. ‘No. I don’t think so – but there’s certainly a resemblance. Who is he?’

  Helen wheeled out her story, watching Fiona’s eyes widen and her mouth twist in dismay at the appropriate places. She kept saying, ‘Oh my God. Oh my God.’ At several points she reached out and touched Helen’s arm.

  And when Helen had finished, she said, ‘Let me see the writing that was on the photo.’

  Helen handed her the photocopy. ‘DC Powell – my police contact in Edinburgh – says Grampian Police went to see Mr and Mrs Beattie yesterday.’ She’d phoned him first thing for a progress report, such as it was. ‘To get samples of Rob’s writing, and show them these photos of Moir. The Beatties say it’s definitely not him. But... sixteen years is a long time. And he could have had plastic surgery. And the Beatties...’

  ‘May h
ave their own agenda?’

  ‘Exactly. If he is Rob... He could have been in touch with them. They could have been helping him, all this time.’

  ‘They’re certainly still convinced of his innocence. And Mrs Beattie – well. She’s gone a bit loonie tunes.’

  Helen smiled. ‘Is that a medical term?’

  ‘In the absence of a more definitive diagnosis... A psychiatrist would probably say she’s within the normal spectrum and her “lacunae” are the result of the traumatic events she’s experienced. She’s not certifiable or anything. But boy has she some strange ideas.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Oh, accusing all and sundry of murdering Rob.’

  ‘Murdering Rob?’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘Who’s she been accusing?’

  ‘Just about anyone who was there that night. Hector, primarily.’ Fiona was looking back down at the photocopy. ‘All I can remember about Rob’s writing is that it was terrible. People with dyslexia often have dysgraphia, especially as children – virtually illegible handwriting. This isn’t exactly copperplate, but it’s not terrible, is it? I wonder, though, if someone with dyslexia – would their writing maybe change more than the average person’s, as they’re starting from a lower base? I don’t know. I’ll check.’ She handed the photocopy back. ‘But Helen –’ She was looking at the photos again. ‘I really don’t think this is Rob.’

  ‘But he could have had plastic surgery.’

  ‘I guess so.’ She frowned. ‘Did this – Moir – have problems with reading and writing? Or any other symptoms of dyslexia? Was he uncoordinated? Did he get motion sickness? Did he confuse left and right?’

  ‘His spelling was pretty bad. I don’t know about motion sickness. But he definitely wasn’t uncoordinated. It was completely believable that he would have been the captain of his school football team. But sometimes I used to think Rob exaggerated his lack of coordination. Before he was diagnosed with dyslexia, I don’t remember him being particularly uncoordinated. It was almost as if he found out that lack of coordination was a symptom of dyslexia, and then pretended to have it as an excuse for dunting into people and breaking things.’

  ‘Boys, in particular, can become uncoordinated for a while once they hit puberty, whether they have dyslexia or not. Even if it was genuine, Rob’s lack of coordination could have been just a temporary thing.’

  Helen blew her nose. ‘He has to be Rob. Otherwise how could he know about me being called “Smellie Nellie”?’

  ‘Maybe you told him, but you’ve forgotten? Or maybe the policeman’s right with his talking-in-your-sleep theory?’

  ‘Maybe.’ She scrunched up the tissue. ‘I think he might have followed me up here. Last night I heard – a tinkling sound outside. Moving under my window.’

  Fiona looked dubious. ‘Tinkling.’

  ‘Like the Sith... Like he was pretending to be the Sith.’

  Fiona’s dubious expression didn’t alter.

  ‘The police think I’ve lost it too.’

  She’d told DC Powell – not about the bells, but about seeing ‘someone’ in the yard last night. Maybe she hadn’t been convincing. Or maybe it was a common thing for victims of crime to ‘see’ shadowy figures in the dark. His promise to alert the local force had been distinctly lacklustre. He’d said the local boys would ‘keep an eye on the place’, which probably meant they’d drive by a couple of times a week.

  Fiona shook her head. ‘Helen, I don’t think you’ve lost it! God, if it was me –’

  ‘What I need to do is get back on my feet, talk to Lorna, and go back to Edinburgh. And while the police are looking for him, whoever he is, I need to find somewhere to live where I can lie low, and see about getting a job. Look into recovering the money from the bank.’

  ‘Fish could help with that. He’ll be here tomorrow, staying with Mum and Dad for a few days. Why don’t I bring him to see you? If you feel up to it?’

  ‘He won’t want to be bothered with work stuff on his holiday.’

  ‘Don’t be daft. He’ll be champing at the bit.’ Fiona was gathering up the photos spread out on the bedspread. ‘What a nightmare.’

  ‘Yes. But enough of my tales of woe – tell me about you and Steve and the girls.’

  Fiona put the stack of photos face down on the bedside table, and launched into a series of stories. Helen let them wash over her, until:

  ‘... When I was eleven my hair either did its own thing or was contained in a ponytail. But it’s all so different these days. The girls in Cat’s class are all little fashion-plates.’

  ‘Talking of which – where’s Irina living now?’ She didn’t care that it was a conversational gaff – that she hadn’t shown sufficient interest in the children. There were things she needed to know.

  ‘Irina? No idea. Somewhere in Europe. France, I think.’

  France? ‘Oh. I just assumed – Has she remarried?’

  ‘I’ve no idea.’

  ‘Is she not in touch with Hector?’

  ‘Hardly.’

  But how could they not be contact, if Damian was still at Glencoil? Well, but the last mention of Damian online in connection with Glencoil was a few years old. She’d assumed that was down to schools becoming cagier about revealing information about pupils, but the simple explanation must be that Damian wasn’t there any more. That he lived in France now.

  ‘That’s a pity. For Damian, I mean.’

  Fiona was looked at her oddly, as if she’d made an even worse faux pas than not talking about the children.

  ‘What’s he like? Damian? Is he like Hector?’

  Fiona’s mouth relaxed in a smile. ‘Yes and no.’

  He was like Hector, probably, in all the ways that mattered. And unlike him physically, and in his rather geeky preoccupations.

  Fiona said, ‘Hector knows you’re here. Everyone in the parish knows by now. He’d like to come and see you, but he wanted me to ask you if that was all right. He seems to feel you might not want to see him.’

  There was hot dampness under her arms.

  Very gently, Fiona said, ‘Do you blame him, for what happened?’

  ‘No! Of course not.’

  ‘But you don’t want to see him?’

  ‘There’s not much point, is there, if I’m leaving in a couple of days.’

  ‘But you’re happy enough to see me, and Fish, and Lorna. What is it between you and Hector, then, if it’s not that you blame him?’

  How like Hector not to tell anyone, even Fiona, about London.

  She shook her head. ‘Nothing.’

  40

  She woke in the dark to the knowledge, the certain knowledge, that there was someone in the room.

  She lay completely still, all her senses straining.

  Could she hear something? The door, very slowly opening?

  She turned her head on the pillow.

  Was that a shape? A blacker shape against the door?

  Her breath trapped in her throat, she shot upright, fumbled for the switch on the bedside lamp – and as light blazed from it she scrambled off the bed and into the corner of the room furthest from the door, her eyes frantically scanning from the door to the bed to the window and back.

  The room was empty.

  41

  She slept fitfully and woke late to a bright blue sky, promising a scorcher. She had a thorough wash at the sink – there was no shower, and the bath was grey with scum – and dressed, and found Uncle Jim in the kitchen, sitting at the table with the Press and Journal and a packet of custard creams. At his elbow was a hideous mug half full of stewed tea.

  ‘Aye aye.’

  ‘Morning.’

  Fly, chewing on an old tennis ball, rolled his eyes up at her.

  There was a throat-catching smell of dog, and tea and old grease, and something less savoury. Every surface was piled with opened letters and torn envelopes, and newspaper with bits of machinery on it, and boxes and, on top of the cold Aga, four huge sacks of do
g food and an orra pair of old boots. An electric cooker stood next to the Aga. There wasn’t room for it to go back against the wall so it stood at an angle to the worktop, as if the tradesman fitting it had left it there temporarily and never come back. The hob was encrusted with burnt spillages, and the once-white oven door was grey, with streaks over it of brown and orange and – oh God – green. The floor around it was similarly encrusted and spattered. The worktop –

  She went closer. Yes, it was the same worktop as she remembered: there were a few places where the marble-effect surface was visible, where the layers of grease and grime were absent – by the sink, where water erosion had presumably prevented build-up. Dirty dishes and cutlery were piled on the draining board. A stained tea towel hung from the rail of the Aga.

  ‘Uncle Jim.’ She pointed to the worktop; the floor; the cooker; the tea towel. ‘This is gross.’

  ‘Good clean dirt, eh, Ben?’ He poked at the dog with the toe of his boot, and Ben brushed his tail across the filthy floor.

  ‘Do you have cleaning stuff?’

  He pointed at the sink. There was a bottle of washing-up liquid next to the taps, its sides smeared black.

  ‘Sit you down, and I’ll get you a cup of tea.’

  ‘Do you have a clean mug?’

  He went to a cupboard, and brought out a mug with a cartoon figure of a woman on it, up to her elbows in suds. ‘Make yourself at home’ was written in red above her, and ‘Wash some dishes’ underneath.

  Helen took the mug from him and looked inside. It was gleaming, white and pristine.

  ‘Christmas present from the Laird,’ said Uncle Jim.

  Her hand tightened on the smooth glaze.

  ‘I’m under orders it’s for visitors. The Laird himself’s the only one uses it, mind. And the Doctor. She gets her tea in it, when she comes. Or her man – he’s a doctor too. Sometimes it’s him that comes.’

  Helen set the mug down on the draining board and filled the kettle.

  ‘The Laird’s aye on at me about getting the wifies that do the holiday houses to come and gie the place a dichting. But I’m nae for it. We like it homely, Fly and Ben and me.’