Claire thought she might learn more by addressing her directly. ‘You’re close to your daughters, Mrs Acton?’
As before, Win Acton took her cue from her husband via a swift glance. His reply was a bluff, ‘Of course.’ Hers a non-committal shrug.
‘And your son, Robin?’
That was when, unaccountably, fear entered the room, sneaking underneath the door like a poisonous gas. Win gave an audible swallow, a noisy gulp before managing, ‘Why do you ask about him?’
‘What happened to him?’
‘He left.’ She pressed her lips together.
‘Why?’
Bailey stepped in then. ‘He was bad. He didn’t fit in with our beliefs.’
‘So where is he now?’
Both Win and Bailey shook their head. ‘We don’t know.’
‘Have you tried to find him?’
Bailey frowned. ‘Yes and no. We asked people. Our people.’ By which Claire surmised they meant their fellow churchgoers.
She pointed out the anomaly. ‘But he wouldn’t have contacted other churchgoers, would he? You say he didn’t fit in with your beliefs.’
The statement seemed to throw them. Bailey Acton frowned and his dark eyes searched the floor for an appropriate response. Which he didn’t find. ‘No one’s seen him.’
‘The police?’
‘Couldn’t find him neither.’
Mistakenly, Claire abandoned the subject.
‘And what about your grandchildren, Eliza and Freddie?’
A flicker passed across Win Acton’s face. Something nervous, a little frightened. She shuddered and again looked to her husband for a cue.
Claire could have sworn Win Acton’s lips moved to form the word, Punishment, but she couldn’t be sure.
‘God’s will,’ Bailey Acton said without emotion.
Claire wanted to say, You think?
But she desisted.
Win put in, ‘They said natural causes.’ And then something like anger spilled out. ‘What difference can it make what they died of?’ A swift glance at her husband followed, as though she was expecting a slap. Her husband’s response was a noisy clearing of the throat. Enough to make his wife press her lips together in case another word slipped out.
Claire pressed on: ‘So you believe there is no truth in Heather’s claims of other lovers?’
Win Acton twitched but her husband answered smoothly, his anger, in front of a psychiatrist, well under control now. ‘Of course not. The Devil’s infected her mind. Heather is a married woman, may I remind you. Married. Her husband is a good and honest man. He was a member of our church.’
But not now.
‘They have a normal marriage even if they did … anticipate the ceremony. Those poor little things.’ Just in time, he remembered to inject some grief into his words. ‘Those poor little things, Eliza and then Freddie. Double tragedy. Well, it was God’s will but they were both her husband’s children.’
So now Geoff was added to the list of lovers in denial.
Bailey banged the desk to give his words increased emphasis. ‘There is no doubt about it.’
‘No – at least, not in Freddie’s case.’
‘Both their cases.’
‘And Heather and Ruth? Did they share your religious beliefs?’
Bailey and Win both nodded.
‘But not Robin.’
Both seemed to falter. Interestingly, it was Win who responded. ‘No,’ she said. ‘He was …’ she looked to her husband for help but came up with her own word, ‘… different.’
Bailey came storming in. ‘Wayward. He did not keep the faith,’ he said and pressed his lips together. Subject over.
Win Acton continued while her husband, this time, listened. And in the thick-set face with coarse features, Claire saw respect. Perhaps she had read this couple wrong. Mrs Acton might be obedient to her husband but there was a steely strength behind her, well hidden from view. Like a woman behind a veil. But it was an acceptance.
‘We trust Geoff with our daughter,’ Win Acton finished while her husband nodded his approval.
‘What about Ruth?’
‘Adores her sister. They’ve always been close. Particularly since …’
A warning shot across the bows. Bailey’s head shot round. Again, Win was silent.
So what, Claire wondered, as she thanked them for coming and ushered them out of the room, had she learned from that?
How deep the religious influence was, something she had, until now, underestimated. So surely, that would have made Heather’s allegations against all and sundry even more shocking? No, for they had passed over that with equanimity and the simplest of explanations. Likewise their son-in-law’s defection from their church. But it was the subject of their missing son, Robin, which had exposed them. So, the answer to what had she learned? Not as much as she should have done.
THIRTY-ONE
Tuesday, 28 July, 11.26 a.m.
38/40
Claire had meant to contact DS Willard earlier to follow up on any information on the whereabouts of Robin Acton but events had kept pushing this to the back of her mind. Besides, after so many years, there was hardly any urgency about it. It could have little bearing on Heather’s mental condition.
Rhoda Tissot had been as good as her word. She or one of her colleagues attended Heather daily, even over the weekend. But ten days before her estimated date of delivery it became clear, by Heather’s actions, holding of her back, sudden exclamations of pain and general behaviour that she was about to go into labour and would soon be transferred to the maternity unit.
Claire watched and waited and left this part of events to the midwives. Her only involvement was to speak, either directly or through the nurses, to find out how her mental state was. She called a meeting of the nursing staff and asked them to pool their ideas, which came thick and fast.
Astrid gave the clearest picture. ‘She’s at the window all the time. Waiting for Charles. It’s pathetic.’
Another nurse, Juno, an import from the Philippines, said, ‘She actually asked me to ring “Charles” and invite him to come in and see her, be present at the birth.’
‘Imagine,’ Astrid said with a dazzling smile. ‘Imagine if she had.’
‘And how is she towards you?’
‘Aggressive, accusing us of not passing on enquiries, phone calls. A few times she’s said she’s heard him in the corridor begging to be let in but we’ve stopped him.’
So auditory hallucinations. ‘Has she been violent?’
Both Astrid and Juno shook their heads. ‘Not recently. Just verbally abusive.’
Edward had had two more sessions with her, trying to learn more about the family dynamics. In the end, he confided in Claire. ‘She’s not saying much,’ he said. ‘It’s as though she’s built a wall around her, family on the inside and anyone else firmly locked out.’
‘So are we to surmise that the psychological pathology is there, inside the family unit?’
‘It’s tempting to think so,’ Edward said. ‘But that’s always an easy pit to fall into.’ He smiled, the warmth lighting his eyes with friendliness. ‘You know as well as I do that there isn’t always a neat and easy reason behind bizarre behaviour. But other questions came to mind, Claire. Questions she’s just as reluctant to answer. For instance, why Tissot? Why did she pick on him? The other two men were, at least, known to her. But Tissot – they at most had a very fleeting acquaintance. But the specifics – the car, the detailed description, the professional man are all correct. It’s only the other details – telephone numbers, details of actual contact, that are absent. Why the request to become his patient when even in her deluded state she must have realized that the result could have been catastrophic for him? Why did she want vengeance on him?’ He paused for her comment.
‘That’s what it feels like?’
He pressed on. ‘And then there’s Ruth. I’ve had two interviews with her. Not an unintelligent woman. She does a good job in
the hospital. She’s well thought of but she just won’t give anything up. Robin’s disappearance is a puzzle and I wonder if it is perhaps the missing piece?’
‘I’m heading that way myself,’ she said. ‘I think I should at least do some looking into it. Did you have any ideas …?’
‘I was thinking of the dates,’ he said. ‘Although nobody can seem to remember exactly when Robin Acton was last seen it does appear it was round about the time that Heather was married. And Eliza was born three months after she became Mrs Krimble. I just wondered if there was any connection?’
‘I need to think about that one.’
He stood up. ‘Must go,’ he said. ‘But I hope I’ve given you plenty to think about.’
She nodded. And after he’d gone, she sat for a while. Yes, there was Ruth. Yes, there too was the absent Robin and the righteous parents. There was the slippery eel, Charles. And soon an unborn child who needed protection. The midwives had said, on their last visit, that it was a toss-up whether Heather would go into spontaneous labour this week or need induction early next. So it was possible that Heather would be transferred within the next twenty-four hours.
She climbed the stairs to the locked ward and found Ruth in the corridor. A midwife, not Rhoda, was in Heather’s room, assessing the progression of labour.
Ruth looked suspicious at the request to have a word. ‘What for?’ The response was almost rude.
‘I want to talk to you about your brother,’ Claire said, sitting beside her to make it less of a formal interview. More of a chat. ‘Tell me what happened.’
‘He left,’ she said flatly.
‘Yes, I know that,’ Claire said patiently. ‘But what were the circumstances?’
Like her mother’s, Ruth’s eyes slid along the floor. Eyes downcast, frowning.
‘I don’t remember.’
‘Remind me of the dates.’
‘I don’t remember.’ Her voice was louder this time.
‘The sequence of events. When did you last see him?’
‘I don’t remember.’ Said through gritted teeth.
Claire changed tack. ‘Was your sister pregnant before he left?’
Ruth blanched. Her eyes flew towards Claire’s face.
Then she recovered herself, drew up her shoulders, gave a silly, girlish laugh and a fluttering gesture with her hands. It’s a good way to avoid answering a question. Act silly. Pretend you’re stupid when you don’t want to answer a question. But Ruth wasn’t stupid. This was an inept act. Finally an answer squeezed out. ‘It’s a few years ago now. I can’t remember the exact sequence of events.’
Claire felt her eyes narrow. So why is it so important that you don’t tell me?
Ruth smiled, stood up and peered through the porthole window into her sister’s room before turning. ‘I really can’t remember, Doctor.’
As an interview, it was completely unsatisfactory and meant to put her off her guard, stop her asking questions, making the responses so fuzzy they were unhelpful. But it had the result of pushing Claire into finally following up the lead with DS Zed Willard.
‘Sorry I didn’t get back. I meant to ring you, Claire.’
How many times have you heard this one? I meant to ring you. My finger was just on the dial pad when you rang. What a coincidence.
She swallowed the yeah yeah of scepticism.
‘You did say Robin Acton of eighteen, The Pike, Brindley Ford?’ DS Willard sounded puzzled.
‘Yes. That’s the one. The brother of my patient.’
‘He’s never been reported missing.’
‘What?’
‘There’s no record of a Robin Acton having been reported missing,’ he repeated.
‘But he left eight years ago and has never been seen again.’
‘Be that as it may, no one’s reported him missing.’ Willard was doggedly sticking to his guns. ‘I did do a bit of digging around.’ He sounded aggrieved now. ‘According to our records, he has no mobile phone, no bank account. No driving license.’
‘He does have a birth certificate?’ Claire was alarmed. Was this just another of the strange sisters’ fantasies?
‘Oh, yeah. He exists all right. Or has existed but there’s no footprint since 2010 and no missing persons’ case file has ever been opened. As far as the force is concerned, he’s not on our radar.’
Claire knew Zed Willard well enough not to reinforce the question: Are you sure?
When she put the phone down she was more confused than ever. This was all about men disappearing and the appearance of other men who denied they were ever there.
It was with real difficulty that she tore her attention from the puzzle of mystery men and focused on her other patients.
As she’d anticipated, in spite of her testimony, Arthur was awaiting trial for grievous bodily harm, one step down from attempted murder. It was something to be thankful for. Perhaps. But hopefully, after Claire’s impassioned description of his family life, assessment of the causes of his outburst and, most importantly, her conviction that he was unlikely to be a danger to others, Arthur would receive a lenient sentence.
And, also awaiting her final discharge, this time in spite of Claire’s assessments, Riley Finch was preparing to return home. Back to the one-bedroomed flat she owned and, presumably, back to her wicked old ways. When the words absolute discharge were uttered, Claire had felt herself tense. Leopards don’t change their spots; neither do folk with severe personality defects. The defects do not heal. Ever.
What, she wondered, would be Riley’s next project? And who would be the next to suffer through it?
She watched her leave Greatbach feeling nothing but apprehension. She could not forget those long, sly eyes sliding down a pregnant abdomen. While Riley was an inpatient she was watched and Heather protected. But out there, in the big wide world, no one would be keeping an eye on Riley Finch. Claire couldn’t forget the way she had smiled.
A carnivore contemplating her next meal.
Wednesday, 29 July, 5 p.m.
Late afternoon brought a distraction in the form of an unexpected but not unwelcome invitation. Rita rang through to her office where she was dictating clinic letters, uncomfortably aware that there was a certain repetitiousness in her phrases.
Disturbed, repeated episodes, unpredictable behaviour, treatment CBT, medication, major tranquilizers, unable to offer an inpatient bed due to staff shortages.
Hmm. It made her feel she was offering a less-than-satisfactory service. And then the phone rang and her day changed.
‘Don’t suppose you have a fancy for another curry or even a drink or something?’
She was taken aback.
He continued, ‘Only the thought of going back to that hovel is just so awful I might just jump on the next plane back to Oz.’
Smiling to herself, she accepted the invitation. But this time she chose the small Italian just round the corner from her home. They could meet up in her office.
He was there fifteen minutes later as she was dictating the last of her letters. The tape would go to Rita for typing and then back to her for checking and signing. And then off to the GP with a copy to the patient. Neat and tidy. Done and dusted.
As he stood in the doorway she was already questioning her sanity – her motive for the words that were about to spill out of her. She really hadn’t thought this through at all. Not even considered what would happen if it didn’t work out. It was an impulse, not sensible. Never sensible to get involved with a work colleague. Luckily … and this was her perceived safety net … she didn’t fancy him. Not at all. Not one tiny little bit. Tall, skinny guys with specs and gingery hair, even if they did have nice eyes and teeth, were not her type at all. She was more into … Oh, stop that. She wasn’t into anything. She was Miss Celibate. That was her name, her aim.
And even if he had been a newly freed Brad Pitt or gorgeous Simon Baker, Tom Hiddleston, Aiden Turner or Daniel Craig, he was off-limits, a married man. 101 per cent taboo. So why invi
te him to be a lodger? Why get involved at all?
She didn’t need the money. She wasn’t short of cash. She managed the mortgage easily on her wage. Houses, even ones as large and beautiful as hers, were under-priced in Burslem, which had both a chequered past, a chequered present and probably a chequered future. Its fortunes had gone down and up and down again like the Big Dipper in Alton Towers. It was proudly and publicly multinational. Saris merged with jeggings, hijabs with turbans, shalwar kameezes with jeans and plenty of bright kanga wear and great mops of material balanced on beautiful ropes of hair, the Jamaican dreadlocks. It was a town where anything went. Even Arnold Bennett.
Here all religions not only lived side by side, they nestled, mosques and churches, a synagogue, Presbyterians, Methodists and a lovely Roman Catholic church. She loved Burslem for that openness, that acceptance, the welcome it gave to people from the far and troubled corners of the earth.
She smiled. Even untroubled Australia. But the question remained stubborn. Why invite trouble? The real reason? Because the house was too big for one and seeming more than twice as big since Grant had gone down the plughole. But, on the other hand, she was getting used to her own company.
She was still analysing her motive behind the impulse when he stood in the doorway, grinning and giving out a scent of clean, fresh soap and still that inexplicable scent of briny air. None of the cheap boarding-house aroma. No tobacco, no fried food, no three-day-old socks. He seemed a genuinely nice guy. He’d come halfway across the world to study psychiatry, stuck a pin in a map and ended up here, right in the centre of the UK, in Stoke-on-Trent. He’d openly said that his interest was in forensic psychiatry. Like hers. This was a shared interest. Her focus was personality disorder and his was depression. Neither of them had ended up on nature’s dangerous doorstep by accident. It had been part interest, part medicine, part law, part a life experience that had spurred them both on. And this she could identify with.
But he lived in a hovel? Not a great spur for him to gain positive images of the UK and Staffordshire in particular.
The Deceiver Page 25