by Antony Moore
She stayed like that for some time and Harvey let her, wanting to smell the groove of her neck, wanting for a little while to see the world through the tangled sanctuary of her hair. Unfortunately, as he tried this latter pleasure what he saw was Josh, standing pop-eyed about three feet away. Harvey did the sigh. He wouldn't have thought he could do it in her arms, but he did. She tried to give him a squeeze, but he politely disengaged himself.
'Er, Mais, this is Josh.'
'Oh, hang on.' Maisie did some dabbing with her tissue and turned round. 'How do you do?'
'Er, yeah cool. All right, Harvey?'
Harvey was inwardly thrilled. Surely no woman could look at him and Josh and come to any conclusion but that she had made a sound choice in selecting him from the gene pool.
Chapter Twenty-eight
The English countryside somehow looks better when you see it from opposite your new girlfriend. The rolling fields full of factories and pretty industrial estates that separate London from the feral south are given added appeal when there is a genuinely beautiful bit of English nature resting her head against the window and sighing. Harvey, who didn't like to face backwards on trains, could see what lay before them down the line. And not just literally either. He had already planned a whole future for them, perhaps a cottage in the country, to supplement the flat in Chelsea. Was she rich? He didn't know or care really. But even if the Superman One angle didn't work out they were going to have a future with money in it. He felt sure of that. He couldn't imagine starving with Maisie beside him. She would inspire him to expansion, to invest in a whole new way of living in the world. He was just concluding his vision with a pony for their first child, and seeing himself suddenly cast rather un expectedly as Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind, when she turned her eyes to him. She had been lost in reverie for a while, letting the view carry her along like a nanny holding her hand. Apart from the offer of a tin of Watneys, Harvey had respected her need for peace. Now she shook herself like an animal recovering from a shock and smiled. Should he tell her about the phone call from Jarvin? There hadn't really been time at the shop and she had been keen to get away, due no doubt to the emotionally tumultuous experience she had just passed through, but also to the presence of Josh. Josh had responded to her with a mixture of brooding jealousy and unbridled curiosity. After being thwarted in his attempt to persuade Harvey to join him in the back room alone for a 'conflab', he had made some muttered remark about married women, which, when asked to explain, he had denied making. After several less audible mutterings, he had then begun the questioning that had finally driven them out, the words 'Well, I'm only asking, I mean she is your bird now, Harvey' still ringing unhappily in their ears. Perhaps Josh didn't reflect so well on him, when Harvey had time to think about it; after all, he had chosen him as his assistant.
'I wonder what would have happened if I hadn't come to the shop when I did.' Her head now was tilted down a little as she considered him, and he admired the small freckled-ness of her nose.
'Dunno. Probably have kicked my head in.' Harvey sipped delicately from the one can he had allowed himself.
'Yes perhaps. But I wonder . . . what were you talking about before I came in? I looked through the window, through a tiny gap between all your posters, and I couldn't believe my eyes. I was going to run in and save you, but then I realised he wasn't attacking you, you weren't even shouting. What were you doing, Harvey?'
That was another thing there hadn't been time to tell her about.
'Um, well, we were talking. About you. At least I thought we were. In fact, I'm sure we were at first. But then I think I went on talking about you, but Jeff started to talk about something else.'
'What did you say about me?'
'I can't remember.'
'Yes you can. What did you say? What did Jeff say?'
'He said he missed you.' Harvey drank more deeply. He might need another, he reflected.
'Did he indeed? What else did he say? The truth, Harvey, please.'
He met her eye. Shit.
'He said you were good in bed.'
'What?'
'And that you were probably faking any orgasms you might have with me. Which I must admit I don't mind at all. If you are, I mean. Or actually, I'd rather you weren't, if you get me. But if you are, or rather if you did, last night, I mean, and in fact this morning, then, well, thanks very much.' He paused, feeling that really that had come out better than he might have expected.
Maisie was shaking her head and Harvey knew what was coming. He did the sigh internally. She might be the most extraordinary woman he could remember meeting, but she was a woman for all that.
'You really mean that after all those years together all Jeff can think of to talk about is sex?'
Harvey sipped his beer and let his mind wander a little, he had enough experience of women to know exactly what was coming.
'And you, when confronted with the ex-husband of the woman you say you like, a man you have known since you were a small boy, a friend you have lost, all you are worried about is whether I fake my orgasms?'
Harvey was aware that while the carriage was fairly empty – the trains usually were quiet after lunch, in his experience – still they had passed one or two people as they made their way to their seats. He didn't worry too much about the noise Maisie was making: this would liven up what was, frankly, a fairly dull journey until they reached the Tamar. He sipped again and then realised she had paused.
'Oh, er, yeah. Well, no. I'm not saying that's all I was concerned about. I'm just giving you the gist of bits of it. He said you would have to fake it with me because I am a wimp or something like that, and I just wondered whether you did or not. It was no big deal. We just talked about lots of things really.'
'I see.' There was a dangerous note in her voice and he kept his eyes on the landscape. 'Well, for the record I have been faking it, as you so elegantly put it, for months. The first time I haven't for a long time was last night. Does that make you feel better?'
Harvey sipped his beer again to disguise the fact that yes it did. Once again, Rhett Butler came into his mind, 'Frankly, my dear . . .' No, perhaps that wasn't the line, but even so, Clark Gable, Clark bloody Gable, no problem.
'I can't believe how shallow he could be. I must admit it only makes me feel better about being out of there. We'd never talked properly about divorce until this morning and it had a horrible sound to it when he said it. But now . . . I guess he's just a waste of time really . . . a complete waste of time ...'
'Well, I don't know . . .' Harvey had said the words before considering them, and was now struck by the strangeness of standing up for the man who beat him up and from whom he was stealing this woman. 'I mean, he might not be perfect but . . . I doubt he was just a waste of time.'
'Are you defending him, Harvey? Is this some manifestation of male solidarity that even I never imagined? Do you think I should give him another chance?'
'No, no,' Harvey said hurriedly and then paused. What was it he was trying to say? 'I don't know, it's just I think there was something going on that you didn't see, in the shop I mean. Jeff was . . . there was something about you that kept him like he was, if you see what I mean. And now you've gone . . . I dunno, it's as if he's gone back to where he was. And he's a bit lost and maybe he did something because of that . . . Oh shit, I don't know what I'm talking about.'
'Hang on, what are you talking about? What else did Jeff say?'
'Well, I don't know really.' Harvey tried to remember. 'I just got the impression . . .' – it sounded silly now to put it into words – 'well, the murder and all that. Jeff seemed to be thinking about Mrs Odd, something like that. I don't know ...'
'The murder? Jeff didn't know anything about the murder. He can't be involved with that. Why would he be?'
'Well, I don't know, but then why would I be? Except that I went to the house and cleaned up the blood and that . . . well, OK maybe I am, but that doesn't mean Jeff isn't. Jarvin seems to thin
k this is all about the past, and remember Jeff was one of the ones who bullied Bleeder the worst. What if there was some memory that he'd forgotten about because he was with you and because it was a long time ago, and then you left him and everything fell down . . . that was what he said: it all fell down, something like that. So he remembered, yeah? And he went back to St Ives and killed Mrs Odd.'
'Jeff killed Mrs Odd? Harvey, that's ridiculous.' She was looking at him with open-mouthed disbelief. 'Why Jeff?'
'Because he's a violent bastard, that's why. And he was upset about you 'cause he knew it was over when you went down there, and he was one of the ones who bullied Bleeder. That's why.' It did sound a bit thin now that Harvey put it into words. 'Well, I don't know. I don't claim to know, but he was certainly a bit psycho in the shop. I thought he was going to batter me and then he went all sort of mellow and far-away and then he looked like a vulture, although not in that order.'
'What are you talking about?'
'I don't know. But there was something weird about him and then you came in and he went back to being how he always is. Or at least I think he did, but I was in the back room for most of the time, of course.'
'Yes you were, and he certainly seemed just like he always is to me, sadly. I always thought he might change, you know, open up to me. I tried so hard to get inside Jeff, but he never let me in. After twelve years together it still feels like I've been with a stranger. And now this whole break-up has happened and still he just stands there and grins like it's all kind of a joke and as if it all just meant nothing. Maybe it did just all mean nothing, Harvey, maybe it was all just a waste . . .' She buried her head in her hands and wept.
Harvey had to admit that the fellow travellers who had chosen the 2.27from Paddington this afternoon were getting their money's worth. From sexual jealousy to murder to marital breakdown. They could have stayed at home watching daytime TV and got no more. He reached across the table and awkwardly rubbed her arm, which was the only bit he could really reach. He considered getting up and going round but that would have meant a struggle past his duffel bag, which was on the seat next to him, and it would have meant sitting down with his back to the engine, which always made him feel sick. So he rubbed her arm and used his free hand to pick up his can and pour some of the Watneys into his mouth and some down his jumper.
When he had cleaned up a bit she had stopped crying and was looking better.
'I'm wondering about his maths teacher,' Harvey said brightly when he was sure she was ready.
'Pardon?'
'Bleeder Odd's maths teacher. He met him at the reunion, I saw them together and I was wondering what they talked about.'
'Mmm. OK, so it wasn't Jeff it was the maths teacher?'
'No, I'm not saying that.' Harvey wiped his mouth delicately with his sleeve. 'I just wonder what they talked about. I bet Jarvin doesn't know about him and I think we should interview him. What if Bleeder told him something important?'
'Like what?'
'I don't know.'
'But I thought we were going down to see Blee . . . I'm not calling him that . . . to see Charles. We can ask him directly, can't we?'
'Well, yes we can.' To Harvey this seemed somehow rather too easy, like watching Star Wars the week after it opened rather than queuing overnight. Surely they should creep up on Bleeder, surprise him with his maths teacher's new evidence, shock him into a full confession . . . that it was Jeff. He said something along these lines to Maisie and she laughed at him and then she got up and came round to remove his duffel bag and settle down cosily in the seat beside him and slid her hand up his leg. Harvey rather lost interest in the countryside for a while and his only thought was that their fellow passengers were perhaps going to get a finale that even daytime TV rarely delivered.
Chapter Twenty-nine
A town can look very different when you are not staying with your parents in it. It can look even more different, and indeed better, when you are sitting in front of a full English breakfast. Even when you are preparing to meet someone you don't know who may well be going to cause you a certain amount of unhappiness or confusion, it can still look pretty good. Harvey gazed out across the wisps of mist that lay beneath them towards the wild white horses of the sea beyond. They were sitting in the conservatory-style restaurant of the hotel to which they had awarded their business the night before. Harvey had decided that a B. & B. just wasn't what a youngish couple in something very close to love really needed and anyway he had long wanted to visit this hotel again. The Atlantic Rollers was set, in an act of glorious Edwardian vandalism, actually on St Ives's principal outreach from the shoreline: Porthminster Point itself, as if all the people who travelled so far to look at this chunk of wild nature would be delighted to find that their hotel was its principal feature. And indeed it seemed they were, because in the foyer every postcard on sale featured the hotel prominently. The boy Harvey had looked up at this hotel and one or two others of the same vintage that were dotted along St Ives's bayfront and wondered at their sense of belonging to another world: like bubbles in which a different air was breathed, city air, with a taste of cigarette smoke and engines and danger in it. And the teenaged Harvey had, with Steve and Rob in particular, sometimes broken into these vast hotels – forced a fire door or found a broken window, and run down their dark, looming passageways, daring his friends to turn corners, to go further into their vast emptinesses, and then fleeing with smothered shrieks. What he remembered most was the fire-escapes that he and the boys would scale to run free on the rooftops, like football fields of white. And always he had wondered what it would be like to come not as a starstruck local boy, nor as an adolescent intruder, but as an adult, as a guest, received and welcomed at the daunting, if faded, splendour of the front door. Having failed so signally to provide Maisie with a memorable location for their first meal Harvey had sensed that this might be the opportunity to provide their relationship with the sort of romantic mise-en-scène that he was sure all women required.
'Pretty, isn't it?' He sipped his coffee complacently and indicated the view.
'Yes it is.' Maisie spoke across the devastation of a hearty man's breakfast table. She had had toast and coffee, Harvey had had tinned grapefruit segments, porridge, kippers, sausage, eggs, fried slice, beans and tomatoes. And toast and coffee. 'Do you feel like a good long walk before we meet Mr Simes?'
Harvey had placed both his hands on his stomach to better enjoy the feeling of being absolutely drumtight, but now he raised them in an attitude of defence.
'You are joking?'
'Perhaps walk off our breakfasts?' She twinkled sweetly and he found that he could deny her nothing.
'Um, OK.' He had thought of a little lie-down, possibly followed by a bit of unscheduled sex to fill in the time before 11.30a.m. when Simes had agreed to meet them in the hotel bar. They had got his name and telephone number from Steve. Maisie had suggested that Harvey's parents might remember him, but Harvey had said Steve would be a better bet. Steve had been excited to hear that Harvey was back and had demanded that they meet that evening 'for many beers'. This nuisance apart, Harvey was satisfied with his progress. Indeed, he was satisfied at this moment with just about everything. Had he not been a fugitive from justice he might even have whistled as they made their way out into the bracing air. The sea looked even better with the wind whipping their faces from the west. Maisie allowed him to put his arm around her shoulders and cunningly shield himself from it with her body. They walked down the path from the hotel to a gate that led out onto the headland itself. And there the grass was springy and the scent of gorse mingled with the smell of the sea.
'Oh, it's fantastic,' Maisie shouted into the wind and freeing herself from his grasp she ran down the track – distinguished only by a narrow line of more beaten grass – and on between the gorse bushes into the banks of heather beyond. The gorse was not in full flower but the odd yellow head showed itself as an irrational flash of brightness against the massing logic of
deep greens and purples. While all for playfulness in its right place, Harvey was unenthusiastic about physical exercise this early in the day. He lumbered after her for a moment or two but feeling the breakfast shudder dangerously within him he slowed almost at once to a walk. There was a hint of stitch in his side and he put his hand there and puffed. Then, realising that she had turned and was watching him approach, he stopped doing both and attempted the confident, outdoorsman's stride. She came to meet him and put her arms round his neck. 'God, this place is alive! It makes me feel alive!' This last word was shouted out into the spinning air and she turned and ran again, leading him on down the path where the grass turned to shale and then up onto the rocks beyond. The rocks, black from the mist, lay like great whales beached on a foreign shore, in a reassuringly wall-like formation. Once over the whales' backs, though, they stepped onto a great disc boulder that marked the edge of the cliff and from which they could look down the spinning drop to the sea below.
'Shit.' Harvey stepped back and put his hand to the great blue-whale rock that reared up beside him. 'I haven't been up here for ages. I'd forgotten how high it was.' Dreams of falling, of rolling down the sides of cliffs, clutching onto tufts of grass that slipped from between his fingers, returned to him. That was the advantage of London, of course: you only had muggers and skinheads infesting your sleeping hours, and the likelihood of being blown into the sea was virtually nil. Maisie did not share his concern and stepping right to the edge of the great disc, looked down for a long time at the waves boiling against the base of the cliff below. She breathed deeply the stinging salt water in the air and it scoured her lungs, cleaning away the residue of the last few days in London. Harvey stayed back on the whale's flank, patting its smooth, cold, damp sides for reassurance with one hand and feeling for his cigarettes with the other. Before he could locate them, she turned back to him, her hair flying in the wind, a blizzard of curls. Striding forward she looked at him as she had looked at the sea and he felt it carried in her eyes, the green of the deep water washed over him and made him gasp. She pulled up his jumper and ran her hands, icy soft from the wind, over his chest.