Two for Sorrow jt-3

by Nicola Upson

  ‘No. I might have mentioned their names in passing, but she didn’t recognise them and she certainly wasn’t interested in finding out more about them.’

  ‘So what did interest her?’

  ‘Bannerman’s relationship with Eleanor Vale. That’s what I was saying—she was soft on the women, then wondered why they threw it back in her face.’

  The name was familiar to Penrose from Josephine’s work. ‘Eleanor Vale was another baby farmer, wasn’t she? But she wasn’t condemned.’

  Ethel Stuke nodded. ‘That’s right.’

  ‘What do you mean by their relationship?’

  ‘It started shortly after Sach and Walters’s execution. That caused a lot of trouble amongst the other prisoners, and some of them took against Vale—taunted her, told her she should have gone to the gallows as well. Some of them said she was even worse than Walters, leaving babies to die rather than finishing them off quickly. You have to understand—most of the women in Holloway then were just drunks or prostitutes. They stuck together, and they didn’t look too kindly on people who took advantage of girls like themselves. They set out to make Vale wish she had been hanged, and they did a bloody good job of it. One night, she couldn’t put up with it any more and she started to smash her cell up. Bannerman was one of the warders on duty, but officers don’t carry cell keys—they have to be fetched from the chief officer, and that takes time.’ God help any woman with a genuine medical emergency, Penrose thought, but he didn’t interrupt. ‘By the time they got there, Vale had managed to break her windows with one of the planks from her bed. Bannerman was first inside to stop her and Vale cut her with a piece of glass, right down here.’ She made a slash from her left shoulder down across her breast. ‘A couple of inches higher, and she’d have cut her throat. As it was, she nearly bled to death.’

  Penrose looked doubtful. ‘Nothing like that appears on Celia Bannerman’s prison record.’

  She gave his naivety the expression of contempt it deserved. ‘Record is a contradiction in terms. Things like that tend to be omitted—they don’t look good at the Home Office.’

  ‘Is that why Celia Bannerman left the prison service?’

  ‘Partly, yes, but let’s not forget who we’re talking about. Most of us would have hated the woman for something like that, but Bannerman took her animosity on as a personal challenge. She forgot that a prison officer’s weapon is power, not reason, and she just redoubled her efforts at kindness. She was religious, I think, brought up in a convent or something—but whatever went on in her head, she went out of her way to forgive the woman. Set out on her own private rehabilitation scheme, she did; looked out for Vale in prison, and even took her into her own home when she got out. That’s the other reason she left, I suppose; officers weren’t supposed to associate with ex-prisoners.’

  Penrose didn’t quite see why this would have satisfied Marjorie’s curiosity; kindness and naivety were hardly crimes to be kept quiet, and the shame of the incident was not Celia Bannerman’s. An affair with a baby farmer, however, would be something worth hiding from the circles in which she moved these days. ‘Were they lovers?’ he asked.

  Ethel Stuke glared at him as though he had deliberately tried to offend her. ‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘Prisoners might occasionally get that sort of thing into their heads, but it’s knocked out of them before it starts. It’s certainly not something an officer would get involved with, not even Bannerman. But it did backfire a little—Vale ended up sticking to her like glue, which probably wasn’t convenient once Bannerman started aspiring to better things.’

  ‘Who else did Miss Bannerman associate with? Was she close to any of the other warders, or anyone outside the prison?’

  ‘No. You say goodbye to a social life when you take that job on. That comes hard to most people at first, but not her. The prison was her life—she didn’t seem to need anything else. A career was all she cared about.’

  ‘And what happened to Eleanor Vale?’

  ‘Bannerman cast her on the scrap heap as soon as she got this new job up north. I took over the lease on her house in Holloway, as it happens, but I told her I wouldn’t have Vale boarding there so she must have asked her to go. She gave me a note with her new address and wished me well, but she didn’t say anything about Vale, and I never heard anything more about her. I don’t know where she went. I wrote to Bannerman a couple of times in Leeds, but she never bothered answering. The next thing I know, her name starts turning up in the newspapers and she’s more important than the Queen.’

  ‘I don’t suppose you still have that Leeds address, do you? And the London house which you took on after she left?’

  ‘It’s probably somewhere about.’ She left the room and went next door, where Penrose guessed she slept; he doubted that she managed the stairs very often these days. When she returned, she was carrying a photograph album stuffed full of pictures and newspaper clippings; from what he could see, most of them were reports of major trials, and it seemed surreal to him to look down at the faces of convicted criminals where he would normally have expected to find family photographs or souvenirs of treasured holidays. ‘Here it is,’ she said, and handed him a piece of paper.

  ‘May I borrow this?’ he asked, and she nodded curiously. ‘Did you give this to Miss Baker?’

  ‘No. She wasn’t interested in anything else after I told her about what had happened in the prison.’

  ‘And did she show you a photograph from a magazine?’ She shook her head. ‘Then I’ve taken up enough of your time, Miss Stuke. Thank you—you’ve been very helpful.’ She looked almost sorry to see him go; in spite of her protestations, she clearly welcomed company if it involved the past, and that augured well for Josephine; the least he could do was pave the way for her. ‘A friend of mine is writing a novel based on the Sach and Walters case,’ he explained. ‘I wondered if you’d be kind enough to help her with her research.’

  ‘If it’s a novel, she’s hardly likely to be interested in the truth, is she?’

  He was surprised by the vehemence of the response. ‘The two things aren’t mutually exclusive. Anyway, I couldn’t help noticing that you like crime fiction.’

  ‘I can’t bear it.’

  ‘But it takes up an awful lot of space on your bookshelf.’

  ‘Most of the things in here are what my sister left. I have read them, but they’re full of mistakes—not unlike her outlook on life in general.’

  He couldn’t help the note of irritation in his voice. ‘So you read them to find fault with them?’

  ‘No one who’s touched real crime would give them the time of day,’ she said, and he wondered what she would say if she knew how much like Celia Bannerman she sounded. ‘So I’m afraid I can’t help your friend.’

  As he stood up to go, his hat caught one of the plants and he remembered what Josephine had said to him. ‘Did Celia Bannerman put violets on the bodies after Sach and Walters’s execution?’ he asked as she walked him slowly to the door.

  ‘No. I did.’

  He was astonished. ‘After everything you’ve said about punishment and paying for their crimes, you offer them a final mark of respect like that. Why?’

  ‘Because by that stage they were innocent again in the eyes of God,’ she said. ‘That’s the point—they’d paid the price and earned my respect.’

  Josephine was pleased to feel the air on her face after the long journey, and even more pleased to discover that she didn’t have to share it with a crowd of people; the narrow lane down to the estuary was almost deserted, and she was able to stand at the water’s edge and take in the view without any distraction other than her own thoughts. The tide was out, exposing wide expanses of glistening mud, much to the delight of the wading birds and wildfowl which wintered there, and across the river she could see the lighthouse and church tower which marked the boundaries of a nearby town. The ferry which might have taken her there was shut up for the winter, but she had no intention of gravitating towards
anything busier than the bank she was standing on; instead, she set out along the beach, enjoying the crunch of the shingle beneath her feet and the unassailable sense of solitude.

  The Suffolk horizon was dominated by the energies of sea and sky, and by the endlessly fascinating play of light on water. At first, the sea seemed flat and grey, but she soon noticed that if you looked at it closely, the water was flecked by hundreds of metallic shades of silver and gold, and she felt that it was the sea of childhood—felt it so strongly, in fact, that she wondered if her parents had brought her here when she was young and she had simply forgotten. If not, the affinity she felt with this particular landscape would have to be put down to an innate recognition of some remote part of herself, of roots that could never be completely dislodged by time or distance. It was one of the miracles of the natural world, she thought, that you could invariably use it to gauge who you really were.

  When she could stand the cold no longer, she turned inland and used the imposing chimneys of a red-brick manor house to guide her back to the village. The Old Cottage Tearooms occupied a pretty, single-storey white building opposite the village green. The beams and floorboards were ingrained with centuries of living and, as she took a table next to the fireplace, she relished the smell of home cooking which filled the room. A bell over the door had rung when she walked in, and she sensed the proprietor hovering behind the kitchen door long before she emerged. ‘What can I get you, Madam?’ she asked, stoking up the fire.

  ‘Some tea, please—and crumpets if you’ve got them.’

  ‘Jam or cheese?’

  ‘Oh, just butter, thank you.’

  She smiled, and Josephine knew what was coming next. ‘You’re not from round these parts with an accent like that,’ the woman said, brushing some imaginary crumbs from the table.

  Josephine was tempted to claim her Suffolk heritage, but she didn’t want to encourage any more conversation than she had to. ‘No, I’m only visiting,’ she said. ‘A friend of mine’s calling on someone in the village, so I thought I’d have something to eat while I’m waiting for him. I don’t expect he’ll be long.’ The woman took the hint and disappeared into the kitchen, and Josephine breathed a sigh of relief. From where she sat, she could see across the green; there was no sign of Archie yet, so she took the envelope from her bag, found her glasses, and began to read. The handwriting was—as he had said—impossible, but she was growing used to it by now, and its quirks and idiosyncrasies were almost as familiar to her as her own.

  ‘Josephine, I’m really tired and life seems a bit grim,’ Marta continued, and the sudden directness of the address unsettled her as it had throughout the diary. ‘I thought how lovely it would be to have four whole free days to write in, but my brain goes back on me. I want to do nothing but idle. There is so much I want to tell you about things that …’

  ‘There you are—crumpets with plenty of butter, and a nice pot of tea.’ She unloaded the tray, and stood back to admire her own handiwork. ‘It’s something sweet you’re missing. I’ve just got a lovely cinnamon and walnut cake out of the oven—how about a nice slice of that?’

  Josephine smiled stoically back at her. ‘Perfect,’ she said, willing to try anything that might keep the woman busy. She went back to her reading, conscious now that her time was limited and wishing she’d braved the cold to sit in a sand dune.

  There is so much I want to tell you about things that—like the strata in a rock—have lain in me since long ago. I have been writing this diary for five months and have said so little—nothing that can interest you. A shaming little record of a shameful little personality—arrogant and unsure. I cannot talk about my work in capital letters, nor theorise about it; I just want to do it, and the lack of opportunity—the result of my own inadequacy—makes me afraid to think about it with anything but flippancy. I do not even pray now the way I did when young, because that prayer would become a drop of water to wear away my heart.

  ‘I know I shouldn’t say it myself, but you won’t find better anywhere in the county.’ A large slice of cake was slapped proudly down on top of the rest of the diary and, to Josephine’s horror, the woman sat down in the chair opposite. ‘I’m Mrs Reynolds,’ she said, obviously hoping for an introduction, but Josephine just nodded. ‘What brings your friend to Walberswick, then? Who’s he gone to see? You did say “he”, didn’t you?’

  Josephine put the pages down, abandoning all hope of getting any further before Archie turned up. ‘A lady called Ethel Stuke,’ she said through gritted teeth. ‘I believe she lives somewhere on the green.’

  ‘Ethel? Oh yes, that house just up on the left,’ she said, pointing out of the window. ‘She’s very popular all of a sudden, I must say. Two girls were here only the other day—they sat where you are, in fact. One of them had been to see Ethel, and very pleased she was with herself, too. Can’t think why—Ethel’s nothing like her sister, Mabel—now she enjoyed a good chat, but Ethel’s not the friendly type at all. She’s the sort of woman who’s never allowed herself a piece of cake in her life, if you know what I mean, so I’m surprised she’s having so many visitors.’

  ‘What were they like, these other girls?’ Josephine asked through a mouthful of sponge. The cake was exceptional, she had to admit, and almost worth the sacrifice she was making for it.

  ‘In their early twenties, I should think—they’d come all the way up from London, just for the day. I remember them because they ordered a piece of every cake we had, and I had to ask them to pay up front—well, you can’t be too careful, can you? The pretty one paid—said it was a sort of celebration, and there’d be plenty more where that came from.’

  That was interesting, Josephine thought; there was no doubt that the girls were Marjorie and Lucy, and it saddened her to think of how short-lived their celebration had been; perhaps by now Archie had discovered its cause. The bell rang as an answer to her prayers, and Mrs Reynolds bustled off to settle another table, leaving her in peace for a moment. Rather than trying to get any further with the diary, Josephine let her mind go back over what she had already read, and her thoughts drifted back to one particular phrase which she remembered from the first few pages. ‘Always when I think of you, I feel we might be together without talking or doing anything in particular, and be happy.’ Thank God Gerry hadn’t read it, Josephine thought; the look of triumph on her face as Marta unconsciously countered Josephine’s objections, offering her the peace she sought, would have been unbearable. She glanced up and saw Archie on his way over the green; hurriedly, she gathered the papers together and shoved them back into her bag. Mrs Reynolds looked at her curiously and, for once, she couldn’t blame her: her behaviour was ridiculous, and it would simply have to stop.

  ‘Crumpet?’ she asked, as Archie sat down.

  ‘No thanks,’ he said. ‘I’ve had enough of Ethel Stuke’s cake to keep me going.’ Josephine could not resist a sly glance at Mrs Reynolds, who had come over to take his order and was obviously not as omniscient as she thought. He smiled at the proprietress, and Josephine watched, amused, as she was temporarily wrong-footed by his charm. ‘But perhaps you’d be kind enough to tell me where the nearest public telephone box is?’

  ‘My brother’ll help you out there, Sir,’ she said. ‘He’s got the grocery store on the main street as you come into the village. He won’t mind opening up for you.’

  ‘Oh, I couldn’t possibly put him to all that trouble,’ Archie said. ‘A public one will be fine.’

  ‘Near the village hall, then. Turn left out of here, and it’s about a hundred yards ahead of you.’

  Josephine stayed behind to pay while he put his call through to the Yard. ‘Bill, I need you to find out what happened to Eleanor Vale—she’s the link between Bannerman and what happened to Marjorie and Lucy.’ He explained briefly what Ethel Stuke had told him, and passed on the addresses. ‘Something happened between those two women which Bannerman wants to forget—I’m convinced of it. Check on the Holloway house and make sure
it was passed on as Stuke says, then find out if Vale ever turned up in Leeds. I know, I know,’ he added, cutting the sergeant off. ‘It’s a needle in a haystack, but just do your best. And if you have no luck, look for suspicious or accidental deaths between …’—he checked his notes—‘between March and August 1905. That’s the time span between Vale’s release and Bannerman’s departure for Leeds.’

  ‘Do you really think Bannerman got rid of her, Sir?’ Fallowfield asked, and distance did nothing to moderate the scepticism in his voice. ‘I thought you said she was full of the milk of human kindness?’

  Penrose considered the contradiction for a moment, imagining a young Celia Bannerman, ready to start a new job and a new life but saddled with an ex-convict through excessive kindness and bad judgement: could she really have taken the ultimate step to press on unhindered with her career? Then he thought about the same woman thirty years later, the woman who had, in her own words, made a decision that work would be her entire life; could she kill to justify that decision? With the image of Marjorie’s bruised and bloody lips still in his mind, Penrose rather thought that she could.

  He was impatient to get back to the Yard, and the journey through Suffolk seemed interminable. Neither he nor Josephine spoke much; both seemed preoccupied by their own thoughts, and he sensed that Josephine was censoring how much she said in exactly the same way as he was, although on a very different subject. At Ipswich, he was relieved to find the London train half-empty, and they had no trouble in getting a compartment to themselves. ‘I’m sorry she wouldn’t see you,’ he said as the train left the station.