The Rumour

by Lesley Kara

  While I’m waiting, I scroll through Facebook. Tash has posted a picture of her ankle, which is massively swollen and badly bruised. She’s put ‘Great excuse to stay at home and watch Netflix’. I press ‘like’ and tap out a comment: ‘Too much vodka last night???’

  She responds within seconds. ‘Running to catch bus, tripped on kerb. We need to catch up. Come and stay SOON.’

  ‘Will do,’ I reply. ‘Miss you.’

  ‘Shouldn’t have moved then!’ followed by a winking emoji is her speedy response.

  I just have time to send her one with a tongue sticking out before I see Anne Wilson’s Clio pull up on the other side of the road. She gets out, pulling a harassed face and mouthing ‘sorry’. The highlights in her hair gleam in the sun as she hurries towards me. There’s no silver-haired man with her today.

  ‘I was going to ring to say I’d be late,’ she says. Her voice has an apologetic, breathy quality. ‘But that would have wasted even more time. I thought it best to press on.’

  Her skin looks even tighter and shinier than before. It’s impossible to gauge how old she is, but she isn’t young.

  ‘It’s fine,’ I say. ‘Honestly.’

  Like last time, the front door of number 24 opens before I’ve even rung the bell. Susan Marchant’s eyes flick from me to Anne and back to me again. For a minute I have the impression she’s going to tell us off for being late, but then she gestures for us to come in. An imperious wave of her arm.

  ‘I’ll be in the garden,’ she says, and disappears down the long hallway.

  Anne Wilson shakes her head in disbelief. As much as Pegton’s need this sale to go through – things have been a bit slow lately; Dave calls it the ‘Brexit Effect’ – I can’t help hoping she decides not to make an offer, and that nobody else does either, so that Susan Marchant is forced to drop the price. It would serve her right for being such a cold fish.

  7

  Mum’s semi-detached bungalow and the one next to it make me think of those before-and-after photos. Both halves are covered in the same sandy-brown pebbledash, but the windows of the house on the left where her elderly neighbour lives are dirty, with ill-fitting curtains, whereas Mum’s are clean and have neat, vertical blinds. Likewise, each half of the shared concrete driveway tells its own story, although I notice that, recently, Mum’s taken to pulling next door’s weeds up out of the cracks as well as her own. I’m surprised she hasn’t offered to wash the windows too.

  She opens the door, a tea towel slung over her shoulder and her cheeks all pink from the heat of the kitchen. Sol barges past her legs to greet me. He’s a ten-year-old Golden Labrador and he’s another reason why Alfie is so pleased to be living here. Alfie is dog-mad, and now that he gets to see Sol almost whenever he likes, he’s stopped pestering me for one of his own.

  Looking after retired guide dogs is something Mum’s been doing ever since I was a little girl. Grandad was blind so she grew up round working dogs. I can still remember all their names: Lulu, Nero, Pepper, and the biggest rascal of all, Quenton, who once ate an entire birthday cake when no one was looking. My birthday cake, as it happens, but I couldn’t be cross with him for long. Especially when he started shaking with sugar overload and we had to rush him to the vet’s.

  When her last dog, Oona, a gorgeous German Shepherd, died of cancer, I thought she was going to hang up her leads for good. All her dogs have been special and, as she often says, you can’t afford to get too attached to them because they’re already old when they come to you, but Oona was a particular favourite.

  In the end, though, she relented. The house didn’t seem the same without a dog in it.

  Alfie comes running out of the living room for a hug. His hands are covered in green felt-tip and there’s plasticine stuck under his fingernails, but oh, he smells so gorgeous I never want to let him go.

  Mum smiles. ‘Alfie, do you want to finish your colouring in while Mummy and I lay the table?’

  ‘Look at my alien spacecraft first,’ he says, thrusting his handiwork under my nose for inspection. ‘It’s got a special rocket blast-off. Look, Mummy. Look!’

  ‘That’s amazing, Alfie. And what’s this little creature here?’

  Alfie and Mum exchange a look as if to say, Fancy her not knowing that. ‘It’s a space robot. That’s his antenna and those are his special claws.’

  ‘Oh yes, of course. Silly me. Aren’t you a clever boy?’

  Alfie marches mechanically into the living room, chanting, ‘Affirmative, affirmative.’

  ‘He loves that book,’ Mum says, laughing. ‘The one you didn’t want me to buy.’

  ‘It’s just the title that annoyed me. The Boys’ Colouring Book, as if girls don’t want to colour in spaceships and aeroplanes. No wonder there are so few female engineers.’

  Mum rolls her eyes and beckons me into the kitchen. She shuts the door behind us. ‘Can we have a quick word?’

  I dump my handbag on the floor and perch on one of the stools at the breakfast bar.

  ‘What’s he done now? He hasn’t been saying “shit” again, has he? I’ve told Michael not to say it in front of him, but you know what he’s like.’

  Mum pulls a face that says, yes, she knows exactly what Michael’s like. ‘No, he’s been good as gold. It’s just that …’ She pauses. ‘I’m worried about him, Jo. Especially after what he went through before.’ My chest constricts. ‘Has he told you about lunchtimes?’

  I stare at her, puzzled. ‘Lunchtimes?’

  ‘How no one wants to sit next to him?’

  The backs of my eyeballs burn as I remember the tummy-ache excuse this morning. ‘He hasn’t said anything about that to me.’

  Mum takes three table mats out of the drawer. ‘This is the second time he’s mentioned it. I didn’t think much of it at first because, well, you know what kids are like at this age – they’re quite fickle when it comes to friendships.’ She hands me the mats. ‘But he’s clearly upset about it. And he says Jake and Liam are always being nasty to him.’

  I go through into the conservatory and set the mats on the table. I’m glad he feels able to confide in her, of course I am. I just wish it was me he’d told first. Maybe if I’d asked a few more questions about Jake and Liam the other day he’d have told me what was going on. I can’t let this happen again.

  ‘He did say something about those two, but I had no idea about the lunch thing. I’ll have a word with Miss Williams tomorrow.’

  Poor Alfie. I can’t bear to think of him sitting all on his own.

  Mum frowns. ‘And that’s not all I’m worried about.’

  Oh God. What else have I missed about my own son?

  ‘He told me that Michael stayed over at the weekend.’

  Hmm. I should have guessed Alfie would say something about that.

  ‘I’ve never interfered in your life, Joanna, and I’m not about to start now,’ she says. ‘But if I don’t say this, it’s just going to play on my mind.’

  ‘Go on, then. Say it.’

  ‘Alfie could quite easily get the wrong idea about things. You’ve said yourself how he sometimes wonders why his daddy can’t live in the same house. If Michael starts staying over, it’s bound to confuse him.’

  Mum presses her lips together. She’s never really understood about Michael and me. She’s quite old-fashioned in that respect. Probably feels a bit awkward explaining our ‘situation’, as she calls it, to her friends, although I know deep down she only has my best interests at heart. She told me once that she thinks I’ve settled for second best, but I don’t need to justify my relationship with Michael – it’s my life, not hers.

  Even so, I find myself explaining. ‘He was exhausted after his flight. It felt mean sending him off again as soon as he’d arrived.’

  ‘So he slept on the sofa, then?’

  I open my mouth to respond, but there’s nothing to say.

  Mum does one of those laughing sighs. ‘He might only be six, Jo, but children are much savvie
r than we think.’

  She turns the gas off under the peas and takes a colander from the cupboard. ‘I hope he uses protection.’

  ‘Mu–um! For God’s sake! Of course he does. We do.’

  Apart from the one, notable exception that led to Alfie, of course, but we don’t need to go over that again.

  ‘Because he’s probably sleeping with other women besides you,’ she says. ‘You do realize that, don’t you?’

  I breathe in through my nose and count to five. ‘We’ve never been exclusive, Mum, I’ve told you that. But one thing I do know about Michael is that he’s honest.’

  Too honest, sometimes. On the rare occasions he has gone out with someone else, he’s always made a point of telling me, almost as if he needs my approval. And I know I could too, if I wanted to. Except I don’t. I haven’t. Not since Alfie.

  ‘He hasn’t been seeing anyone else for a long while now,’ I say. ‘And if he does meet someone he wants to be with, he’ll tell me. I know he will.’

  Mum sighs. ‘I’m sorry, darling. I can’t help worrying about you. It’s all part of being a mother, you know, worrying about your children. It never stops, even when they’re all grown up. I just want you to be happy and not have to go through what I went through with your father.’

  She puts the usual ironic emphasis on the word. Poor Mum. It’s hardly surprising she has such a dim view of men.

  She squeezes my shoulder. ‘Do you remember when you were little and you had that imaginary friend? I was so anxious when you started school. I thought the other children would tease you about it.’

  ‘Oh yeah, Lucy Locket.’ I smile at the memory.

  Mum laughs. ‘I can’t tell you how relieved I was when you stopped nattering away to yourself in your bedroom.’

  ‘Actually, it’s perfectly normal for young children to have imaginary friends. I read up about it once. It’s a natural part of their development.’

  ‘I know. I’m only teasing.’ Mum passes me the salt and pepper to put on the table. ‘It sounds like Alfie just needs a bit of help settling in. Maybe it would help if you made friends with some of the other mums, invite their children round for tea or something. I got talking to Hayley’s mum when I picked him up today. Karen, is it? Her mother was there too – nice lady, painfully thin. She’s moved in with her, I think she said. They both seemed really lovely.’

  ‘Karen goes to my book club,’ I say. ‘I think she’s also the secretary of the PTA. I find her a bit intense, to be honest. And anyway, Alfie’s not too keen on girls.’

  Mum laughs. ‘You wait till he’s a teenager.’ She takes three plates from the cupboard and puts them in the bottom of the oven to warm.

  Alfie’s head appears round the door. ‘I’m starving.’

  Mum rests her hands on her hips. ‘Well, it’s a good job supper’s ready then, isn’t it?’

  She’s right. Of course she is. I’ll have to try harder with the other mums. For Alfie’s sake. Get myself invited on to their coffee-morning circuit if I have to. What did Tash say when I told her I was moving out of London and going part time? That it wouldn’t be long before I became one of those mums who take over a whole coffee shop and talk endlessly about their offspring. I told her, ‘No way.’

  But still, if it makes Alfie’s life a little easier …

  8

  Later that night, about five minutes after Alfie’s gone to sleep, the phone rings. I grab it before it wakes him up.

  ‘I think I might be on to something about Sally McGowan,’ Michael says. We’ve barely said hello.

  ‘You’re kidding.’

  ‘I’m not. I bumped into an old mate of mine who cut his teeth on the first big exposé. You know, when she was hounded out of Coventry.’

  When Michael uses the phrase ‘old mate’, it could mean absolutely anything. An old hack he crossed paths with once. An ex-criminal-turned-informant. An innocent bystander happy to embellish a story for five minutes of fame and the gratitude of a good-looking journalist with kind eyes. What it rarely means is a ‘mate’.

  ‘Bumped into’ is also not how it sounds. It’s not like me ‘bumping into’ Maddie in the school playground this morning. ‘Bumped into’ in Michael’s world means ‘tracked down by any means possible’.

  ‘They set her up somewhere else,’ he says. ‘Gave her a new name. A new legend.’

  A legend? He’s really enjoying this. I can tell from his tone of voice, the way he’s spinning it out, like some CIA operative in an American movie.

  ‘Sometimes it takes months before they’re ready to go it alone. My source reckons Sally McGowan was a quick learner.’

  ‘Your source or your mate?’ I say.

  ‘Ha ha. Now here’s the thing. One of his sources – and he swears this guy was legit – got pissed one night and let it slip that she was safely stashed away in one of those seaside towns you go to die in.’

  ‘Hmm. So you automatically thought of Flinstead.’

  ‘Well, if the cap fits … No. I haven’t finished yet. The last thing this bloke said, before he became too inebriated to speak, was that, if it was him, he’d rather take his chances with an angry mob than wind up in a town with no pubs.’

  He waits for this to sink in. Flinstead used to be famous for being a ‘dry’ town. It was big news when it finally got a pub, in the early noughties.

  ‘Who was this source?’ I say. ‘I mean, if it was someone on the inside, someone privy to Sally’s new identity, he wouldn’t be stupid enough to go drinking with a reporter, would he? He’d be bound by a strict code of secrecy.’

  Michael laughs. ‘Where human beings are concerned, secrecy is never guaranteed. There was nothing my mate could do with it anyway. No editor would touch it with a barge pole, and nor can I. The injunction, remember? I just thought you’d be interested.’

  Am I interested? This is the question I ask myself when we’ve said goodbye and I’m getting ready to go upstairs, checking the gas rings are all turned off, even though I know full well they are – we didn’t even eat here tonight. It was all such a long time ago. If it’s true and Sally McGowan really is living in Flinstead, what difference does it make to my life, or anyone else’s for that matter?

  She was a child then, an abused, damaged child. From what I’ve read, the police found lots of cuts and bruises on her body. Old wounds, some of them. Her father, a drunken bully of a man by all accounts, said she was a devious child who’d inflicted the damage herself so that people would think it was him. The mother went along with this story. What’s so terrifying is that people actually believed them.

  I can’t get Sally McGowan’s ten-year-old face out of my mind. Those startlingly defiant eyes. If anyone should have been sent to prison it was Kenny McGowan and, arguably, the mother, Jean. Although it’s pretty clear now, from a twenty-first-century perspective, that she was also being abused. We’ve come a long way since the sixties, thank God.

  Or have we? I’ve been trawling through Twitter and the comments sections of various online articles lately, looking at the sort of things people are still saying about Sally and other, more recent child killers. The hatred and venom are staggering. The lust for revenge like something out of the Middle Ages. And all from people who aren’t even the victims’ families, who don’t even know them.

  What was it Cathy said? That she’d prefer it if someone like that was mobbed by vigilantes than be protected. Is that what would happen in Flinstead if this rumour gained purchase and someone tracked Sally down? Would Cathy and Debbie and the rest of them be standing on the pavement outside her house, hurling abuse, or worse? Would our quiet little town be forever known as the place where Sally McGowan was discovered? And how would I feel if that happened, knowing I was instrumental in passing it on?

  I take one last peek at Alfie before turning in. He looks so adorable I can’t resist planting the softest of kisses on his cheek. It’s shocking to think that when Sally McGowan killed that boy she was barely four years older than
Alfie is now. I tiptoe out of his room, taking care to leave the door ajar the way he likes, so that he can see the landing light if he wakes up.

  As I snuggle down in my own bed I remember the batteries I bought at lunchtime, still sitting in that brown-paper bag along with the incense sticks. I took the dead ones out of the alarm this morning and there’s no way I’ll get any sleep if I don’t put the new ones in.

  Halfway downstairs, I realize I’ve forgotten something else too. I didn’t tell Michael what Alfie said to Mum, about no one sitting next to him at lunchtime. Tears fill my eyes as I picture him at an empty table, swinging his little legs under his chair and pretending he doesn’t mind. The sooner I make friends with the other mums, the better.

  9

  Whatever Mum said to Alfie yesterday, she must have reassured him, because there’s no sign of a tummy ache this morning. He does seem quieter than usual, though.

  ‘Shall we go to the beach after school and have an ice cream?’ I say. His little face brightens. ‘Maybe some of your friends at school could come with us.’

  Alfie looks doubtful. ‘Maybe,’ he says.

  I widen my eyes to stop them filling with tears. If only I could make his troubles disappear. Kiss it all better like a graze on the knee. I sweep him into my arms and hug him tight, blow raspberries on his neck to make him giggle.

  ‘Come on, finish your cornflakes and let’s get going. We don’t want to be late.’

  It’s the first time we’ve left the house this early, but I want to have a quick word with Miss Williams. Normally, we set off at exactly seven minutes to nine. That gives us just enough time to get to the school and join the queue outside the class before the bell goes.

  I’ve been selfish, I realize that now. Timing it so that there’s less time standing around with the other mothers. If I’d thought about it earlier, I could have gone to one of their coffee mornings and maybe Alfie would have a few more friends by now.

  Cathy and Debbie barely glance at me as I arrive. It’s hardly surprising. They tried extending the hand of friendship a few weeks ago and I turned it down. What with my comment about vigilantism the other day, they’re hardly likely to try again. Nobody ever warns you about this sort of thing before you have children. Nobody tells you it pays to make friends with the other mothers, even if you’ve nothing in common. I’m going to have to swallow my pride and appeal to their better natures. Tell them Alfie’s having trouble settling in and that I’d appreciate their help.