The Weight of Angels

by Catriona McPherson

  The French window was opening. As I watched, Dr Ferris slipped out through a slim gap, her head still turned to the inside, leaving the door ajar. She stepped very softly down the three stone steps and, keeping close to the house wall, she hurried to the front corner and peeped round it. Seeing no one, she put her head down and scurried across the gravel to the last parking space, right under the trees, puddles all around, where she had left her car. She got in, closed the door without a sound and then, taking the brake off, she used the little slope on the drive to roll silently away, not starting the engine until she was round the first bend. Even straining to catch it, I could hardly hear it.

  It might have been nothing. Even watching her, I thought maybe she was having an affair or maybe she’d heard the arrival of some heart-sink visitor she couldn’t face. I knew all about them. There was a woman who ‘dropped in’ to Face Value whenever she was in town and wouldn’t take no for an answer, always sure I could squeeze her in if I tried. I used to get Reception to buzz up and I’d leave by the fire escape.

  So Dr Ferris’s sneak getaway might be nothing to do with my night shift but sometimes it’s good to listen to your gut and my gut was telling me it was a sign written in red letters, three feet high. I needed to tell the Swains to get Julia away, tell the – oh, what was Sylvie’s name? – well, her family that she was in danger. Hope they believed me.

  But I couldn’t ask Julia for her mum’s number. She might be faking her disorder but she was just a bit too good at it for me to trust her. And she was only eighteen. There must be another way. It had to be close. The new house Julia had spoken about was built on some remaining corner of the estate they’d sold to the army. But I couldn’t just drive around knocking on doors. There must be some way.

  I put my chin up and my shoulders back and walked towards the front corner of the house as I had every right to do. Then, when I was in the lee of the walls and invisible to anyone looking out, I darted round the side, up the stone steps and in at the French window.

  I went over to the hall door first to see if I could lock it against anyone trying to get in, but Dr Ferris had had the same idea and the door was already bolted on the inside. I put my back against it and looked around. There was nothing so old-school as filing cabinets, and they’d have been locked anyway, full of confidential patient information. There was a new phone book, still in its plastic wrapper, wedged into the top shelf of a low bookcase, but that pretty much summed it up. No one’s in the phone book, these days. I unwrapped it anyway and checked, but Mona Swain certainly wasn’t and neither was Peregrine Uving. And what was Sylvie’s family’s name?

  Dr Ferris didn’t have anything so handy as a Rolodex or a fat Filofax on her desk top either.

  So far, all I had done was walk through an open door, look in a phone book and cast my eyes over the surfaces of a room. It was when I stepped around the desk and tugged the handle of the top drawer that I crossed the line. I don’t even know what I was looking for. Maybe that Filofax after all, or one of Mona Swain’s business cards. If she would even have business cards when she had no business. A little frog of hope leaped into my throat when the drawer opened and another joined it when I recognized what I was looking at in there: invoices, some of them with cheques stapled to the tops. But there was no SWAIN among them.

  I tried the next drawer down but it was full of highlighter pens and Post-it notes, boxes of paperclips, and cartridges for a colour printer. Losing hope, I opened the bottom drawer.

  It took a long moment for the sight that met my eyes to make sense to my brain. I blinked twice, half expecting it to disappear. But when I reached my hand out, it was as real under my touch as the warm polished wood of the desk top where I put my other hand to steady myself in case I fell in a faint to the floor.

  It was in a plastic sandwich bag, sealed shut with that zip thing that I can never get to work, either unable to shut it or unable to prise it open. It was filthy, crusted with grit and rusted, the glass crazed and missing some shards that had gathered in the bottom of the bag, but it was unmistakable. A Timex watch with its bracelet still closed. It had been wrenched from the skeletal hand of a long dead man without being opened.

  I slipped back out of the French window and ran round to go in the front door, not caring this time who saw me.

  Chapter 21

  Angelo came first. I hurried into my little treatment room and phoned home. It took three calls to rouse him. The first one got kicked to the answering machine; the second one let me switch the automatic answer off. With the third call I let the bell ring out for a solid two minutes until, at last, enraged, Angel swiped up the phone and shouted, ‘Sod off, will you? The fuck is wrong with you?’

  ‘Angel, it’s Mum,’ I said. ‘And I need you to listen to me. I don’t have time to go into it all just now, but I need you to promise me something. If Dr Ferris gets in touch with you, hang up. If she comes to the door, don’t answer.’

  ‘Dr Ferris?’ he said. ‘Your boss? Why would she want to be phoning me?’

  ‘Dr Ferris, your therapist,’ I said. ‘Promise me.’

  ‘Mum,’ said Angelo in his ‘duh’ voice. ‘I haven’t got a therapist. What the hell are you talking about?’

  I said nothing for a minute, then the words tumbled out so fast even I couldn’t make sense of them. ‘Angelo, don’t lie to me. It’s too important. I know you spoke to her and I know she told you about Sylvie and the Mercat Cross.’

  ‘Told me about Sylvie?’ he said.

  I bludgeoned on. I should never have told him his sister was called that name but now wasn’t the time to fix it. ‘I know you’ve phoned her from our landline, Angel. And, for God’s sake, I met you halfway down the drive that night you were so upset. Stop fannying about and start talking straight to me, right? You’ve told me you didn’t show the picture of the watch to anyone, but answer me this: was she there with you when you took it?’

  His breath was a long fuzzy blast down the line as he let it go.

  ‘Was Dr Tamara Ferris at the abbey with me when I saw the hand?’ he said. ‘Eh, no, Mum. What have you been smoking?’

  ‘Okay, okay,’ I said, then my breath caught. ‘How do you know her first name?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Never mind,’ I said. ‘My brain’s fizzing, that’s all. Listen, email me the picture of the hand, eh?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I know for sure the watch wasn’t on the hand when the cops turned up.’

  ‘How?’ he said. ‘Who told you that?’

  ‘Because I found it. It’s at Howell Hall.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘And, Angel, I really need to you to be honest with me. Did you take it off the corpse and give it to the doctor?’

  ‘What? No! Fuck sake. What is it with you trying to make out I’m in cahoots with Dr bloody Ferris?’

  ‘Okay, okay,’ I said. ‘I believe you. Angel, I don’t know what this means but if she comes to the door, don’t let her in and, for God’s sake, don’t go anywhere with her. Okay?’

  ‘I promise I won’t go anywhere with Dr Ferris,’ Angel said. ‘Or let her in the house.’

  ‘And email me the—’

  ‘I have,’ he said and, right enough, I heard the plink of an email landing.

  ‘And stop talking to me as if I’m some kind of moron, eh?’ I said. ‘You don’t know everything, Angelo.’

  ‘That makes two of us, then,’ he said, and was gone.

  I opened the email and looked at the picture to make sure, but I knew already. There was no doubt of what I’d found. As to what it meant, that was a different question and one my brain couldn’t even take the first nibble at.

  I tried Marco’s phone, but it went to voicemail. So I tried T&C and got Mel, who hadn’t forgiven me for making her feel bad about a pilfered stamp and was in no mood to help me.

  ‘He’s out,’ she said.

  ‘Can you tell me when he’ll be back?’

  ‘If he’s
not answering his phone . . .’ Mel said. ‘Your marriage is your business.’

  ‘If he’s not answering his phone it means he’s driving,’ I said. ‘If he gets back can you tell him to call me? Or – here’s a thought – do you know where he’s going? To a job? A wholesaler? Can you give me a number?’

  ‘I’ve got no more idea where your husband is than you have, Ali,’ Mel said. ‘I might not be the employee of the month in your opinion but I know more than to grill my new boss about his doings.’

  ‘Well, can you maybe put me on to the manager?’ I said.

  ‘Chrissake, how many different ways have I got to tell you?’ she said. ‘Are you away to La-la Land again, likes of?’

  I hung up and stared at the phone. La-la Land? How did Melanie from school know that I’d been . . . a ‘mental-health-service user’ was what it was called, these days. The rest of her words were lost under that and didn’t hit me until much, much later. Didn’t even graze me as they went whooshing by.

  Surraya was in the big meeting room with her depression group, Jo and Harriet, dragged away from their jigsaw for once, and two more I didn’t recognize. One of them was crying softly into a crumpled tissue.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ I said, hovering at the door, ‘but can I have a quick word?’

  Surraya’s eyebrows lowered and her eyes were like chips of granite as she glared at me. ‘One minute,’ she said to the group, and she laid a hand on the shoulder of the crying woman, patting her as she passed.

  ‘Ali, you can’t do this,’ she whispered, when we were outside in the corridor. ‘Group’s sacrosanct.’

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘I’m sorry. I just need two things. I need you to beep Lars for me and I need you to— Actually, can you just beep Lars and I’ll ask him?’

  Surraya had already keyed the number into her phone. She waited, then said, ‘Don’t start. It’s not me. Ali needs you in the main hall . . . Lars, I know. I’m in Group. Oh, for f—’ She hung up and glared harder than ever. ‘He’s coming,’ she told me. ‘You’d better think up something good before he gets here.’ Then she disappeared back inside and shut the door smartly.

  I heard Lars in less than another minute but that didn’t stop me kicking myself for not asking Surraya the other question and getting a jump on it. I was already asking as I ran up the stairs to meet him, my phone all ready in my hand.

  ‘What’s Sylvie’s surname?’ I said, as we met on the half landing.

  ‘You’re kidding?’ said Lars. ‘You got me out of a one-to-one for this?’

  ‘No, I got you out of a one-to-one to get your car keys,’ I told him, holding out my hand, ‘but while we’re at it, what’s Sylvie’s surname?’

  ‘Bos—’ Lars began.

  ‘Boswell!’ I chimed in. ‘It was right on the tip of my tongue. I don’t suppose you know the address or phone number offhand, do you? Well, can I borrow your car?’

  ‘Ali, what’s going on?’ said Lars. ‘If you’ve had another breakthrough with Sylvie you’ve got to tell Dr Ferris. You can’t go piling off to her parents like a maniac. Look, I need to get back.’

  ‘Lars,’ I said. ‘Can I trust you?’

  ‘You’re starting to worry me,’ he answered. ‘But aye.’

  I stared at him, hardly knowing where to start. ‘Picture speaks a thousand words,’ I muttered, woke my phone, scrolled to the email and hit the attachment, handing it to him as the picture started loading.

  ‘What am I looking at?’ he said, pinching his fingers and flicking them wide to zoom in.

  ‘That’s the hand that was sticking up out of the ground at the abbey,’ I said.

  Lars lifted his eyes to mine, then dropped them back to the picture. He stepped back and rested his bum on the landing windowsill behind him. ‘It’s got a watch on,’ he said. ‘The cops never said anything about a watch.’

  ‘They didn’t know,’ I said. ‘It was gone before they got there.’

  ‘Wait,’ he said. ‘How do you know that? How did you get the picture?’

  ‘My kid took the photo,’ I said. ‘But he didn’t take the watch. I just found it in Dr Ferris’s desk drawer.’

  He stared at me. ‘The watch from the corpse at Dundrennan is here?’

  ‘Hidden in Dr Ferris’s bottom drawer,’ I said. ‘You can go and check if you don’t believe me. There’s no one in the office. But I wish you’d just believe me.’

  ‘And you didn’t put it there?’ he said. ‘You didn’t get it from your kid and plant it there?’

  ‘I didn’t,’ I said. ‘It’s your choice whether or not you believe me. And my kid didn’t take it and give it to her. He says he didn’t and I can tell when he’s lying.’

  The silence lasted until I could hear the blood screaming in my ears, like a train in a tunnel.

  ‘I believe you,’ he said at last. ‘But, Ali, what the fuck’s going on?’

  Relief stopped me talking until I had taken three or four big gulping breaths. Then: ‘I think Dr Ferris is going to . . . harm Sylvie. And possibly say Julia did it, but definitely blame the whole mess on me. Tonight.’

  ‘What?’ Lars shook his head, as if he had water in his ears. ‘Ali, I’m trying to accept what you’re telling me. I want to, but you sound paranoid. And what’s it got to do with the hand and the watch?’

  ‘Nothing that I can see,’ I said. ‘Except maybe it’s evidence that she’s “harmed” someone before.’ I nodded at the phone. ‘So, again, do you know how I can contact Sylvie’s family?’

  ‘Not a clue,’ said Lars. ‘Her bills get paid by a trust and no one ever visits. Not in the time I’ve been here anyway.’

  ‘Boswell,’ I said. ‘Are they local?’

  ‘No idea,’ Lars said. ‘But I can tell you the trust money comes from a solicitor with offices in Dumfries. So probably, eh?’

  ‘I’d never get a solicitor to give anything away,’ I said. ‘But, come on – it’s Galloway.’

  ‘Right?’ said Lars. ‘Naebody here except three old farmers and a dead sheep.’

  ‘Can’t be that many Boswells anyway.’

  ‘Why not go to the poli— Oh, yeah,’ Lars said.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Angelo.’ We were silent for a moment. ‘Hey, you never said what your other two girls were called. As well as Lola.’

  ‘Maddie, Lola and Saran,’ he said. He smiled. He knew I had mentioned his girls to get under his skin, make him think like a dad. ‘You reckon something’s set for tonight, eh?’

  I smiled back to tell him I knew he knew. ‘Will you stay on? Watch Sylvie?’

  ‘Course I will,’ he said. ‘Who wouldn’t?’ He gave me a grin, one that showed the black caves in his mouth where his molars should have been and for some reason I hugged him.

  ‘You’re not going to do anything daft,’ he said, into my hair. ‘You’ll take care, eh?’

  ‘I’m only going to find Sylvie’s family and tell them . . . Well, tell them she’s talking for a start and tell them I’m worried she’s not safe.’

  ‘We could all lose our jobs,’ Lars said, letting me go and stepping back. ‘But if you’re right enough about Dr Ferris being mixed up with the corpse, we’re all going to lose our jobs anyway.’

  When he lifted the chain from round his neck and held it out to me I thought he was giving me a good-luck charm, a blessing on my quest. ‘My car keys are in my locker,’ he told me.

  The soldier in the kiosk lifted a hand and gave a lazy wave as I went by. I answered with a bib on the horn as I slowed, wondering which way to go: Kirkcudbright was closest, Castle Douglas was biggest, Dalbeattie was where I knew people well enough to march up and start asking who remembered a family called Boswell. Then, cursing myself for a fool, I threw the car into reverse, pulled back to the kiosk again and climbed out.

  ‘La— Oh, I thought it was Lars,’ the soldier said.

  ‘I borrowed his car,’ I explained. ‘And I was wondering if I could borrow something of yours too.’ He stood up – stood t
o attention, really. He made me think of a gundog, a-quiver from his crew cut to the toes of his shiny boots to give me whatever it was I wanted from him. ‘Can I look up a number in one of your phone books there?’

  He gave them a glance as if seeing them for the first time. ‘They’re all out of date,’ he said.

  ‘Out of date’s what I’m after,’ I told him. ‘Fifteen years out of date, if possible.’

  We both set to, rummaging through them two by two – a phone book and a Yellow Pages for each year. The oldest one was from thirteen years back. I plucked it out of the pile and stifled a sneeze at the dust it let go. ‘If you don’t mind me asking,’ I said, ‘why have you got these?’

  ‘Never got an order to discard them,’ the soldier said.

  I busied myself looking for the start of the Bs so he couldn’t see the look on my face. And there it was! Boswell, Col. & Mrs. R., White Bay House, Kirkcudbrightshire. And a number.

  ‘Found what you were looking for?’

  ‘I’ll just put this number in my phone,’ I said.

  ‘Or just . . .’ said the soldier, ripping out the page and handing it to me. I really didn’t get the army.

  White Bay was round the estuary down towards the next headland. These little lanes, there was no way you could afford to take your attention off the road but I couldn’t resist it: I put the number in and put my phone in the stand on speaker when I heard it ringing out.

  ‘Hello?’ said a voice, after the fifth ring. A stern-sounding voice, posh and confident. Another one.

  ‘Ah, hello,’ I said. ‘Is that Mrs Boswell, by any chance?’

  There was a hesitation, long enough for me to think that of course the family had moved on. That this was whoever bought White Bay House from them. Then the woman said, ‘Yes? Who is it?’

  I shot my hand out and killed the call. I couldn’t do it on the phone.

  Pulling over into a driveway I got my satnav up and punched in ‘White Bay House’, then stared dumbly, with a chill creeping over me, when the answer came. White Bay House wasn’t at White Bay on the next headland. It had got that name because it looked across the estuary at White Bay. My map app told me my destination was 0.3 of a mile away and in current traffic conditions my journey would take one minute. I was actually parked at the mouth of the drive to Sylvie’s house, where her mother still lived, fifteen years of no visits later.