by Diane Janes
Humiliated, I returned to the drawing room and waited for an appropriate pause in which to break my news.
‘So you can’t think of any reason why it would have been in her room?’ Mathieson was asking.
Simon’s skin tone was now approaching another extreme. Where he had been deathly pale, his cheeks now burned like guilty sirens. ‘No,’ he said. At least his voice was emphatically confident, as he added: ‘Absolutely none.’
‘And you say you’d missed it sometime before? Possibly in the student common room?’
‘I can’t honestly be sure,’ said Simon. ‘That’s the last time I actually remember that I was going to use it – but – well, I don’t know. It’s not easy to remember. It wouldn’t have seemed very important at the time. I wouldn’t have missed it unless I actually looked for it, because – you know – I wanted to use it. I only noticed I hadn’t got it when I was packing up to come home.’
‘How about your room-mate?’
‘I didn’t have one,’ said Simon. ‘I had a room to myself
They noticed me lurking empty-handed in the doorway. ‘I’m ever so sorry, but I’m afraid we’ve got no milk. Would you like some orange squash instead?’
Sergeant Mathieson’s companion emitted a derisive snort. The sergeant himself – who hadn’t seemed all that excited by my offer of tea – now looked distinctly irritated that it wasn’t forthcoming. ‘Not for me, thanks,’ he said. ‘What about you, Jim? Do you want some orange squash?’ He made the offer sound ridiculous, emphasizing the words ‘orange squash’ as if he had never heard of anything so ludicrous in his life. His colleague responded with a shake of the head.
‘So . . .’ Mathieson turned back to Simon. ‘You’re staying here for the rest of the holidays, are you?’
‘Until my uncle gets back at the end of August,’ Simon corrected. ‘After that I expect I’ll go back to my parents’ until term starts.’
‘And are the other people here all friends from university?’
‘No,’ I jumped in smartly. ‘I’m at teacher training college, in Birmingham.’
‘How many of you living here?’ asked the other policeman. He said it so casually – as if it wasn’t important at all. Did he notice Simon’s hesitation?
‘Three – just myself, Katy, and our friend Danny, who’s working out in the garden.’
Digging a grave, digging a grave, my newly diagnosed Tourette’s wanted to shout, but I wouldn’t let it.
Just then a new idea gripped me. Suppose they produced a search warrant. Trudie’s possessions were still scattered all over her bedroom – with perhaps among them evidence of who she actually was. It wouldn’t take the slowest of Mr Plods two minutes to work it out. There was no possible way we could explain it. Something would have to be done about her things. I stood there racking my brains for a plausible reason to go upstairs, so that I could gather all Trudie’s stuff together and hide it – but where? And if they found her things all bundled up under a bed or stuffed into the back of a cupboard, wouldn’t that look even more suspicious? Couldn’t we just say she’d gone out somewhere? But then Simon had already told them there were only three of us – and three into four lots of clothes won’t go. One wild idea after another. We ought never to have moved her body – in doing so, we had only made everything appear much, much worse.
‘So . . .’ Sergeant Mathieson was consulting some notes. ‘You don’t think you could have lent it to Rachel Hewitt, then?’
I swallowed hard. At least they appeared to have lost interest in the make-up of our household.
‘No,’ said Simon. ‘I’m sure I would have remembered.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I hardly knew Rachel Hewitt,’ Simon said – a bit crossly, I thought. ‘So I wouldn’t be likely to lend her anything. She wasn’t on the same course as me and we didn’t live in the same block. I saw her a few times, because our blocks shared a common room – but we used separate kitchens. I don’t think we ever spoke to one another.’
Sergeant Mathieson looked as if he might be getting cross too. He had been denied his cup of tea and now he wasn’t getting very far with Simon. ‘So you’ve got no idea how your screwdriver came to be in this girl’s room? You didn’t lend it to her – or anybody else, so far as you can remember – you weren’t on her course and you lived in a different block. You haven’t got any suggestions at all?’
‘I can hazard a guess, if you want me to,’ said Simon. ‘As I said before, the last time I remember seeing my screwdriver was when I took it down to the common room because someone wanted the plug on the record player fixed – but when I got down there with it, another guy – Keith, I don’t know his second name – was already mending it. I didn’t go straight back to my room. I stayed and talked for a bit and I suppose I must have put the screwdriver down and forgotten about it. I assume I went back to my room without it and later on someone else picked it up – maybe took it back to their room to use it for something and never returned it. It’s like that, I’m afraid. There’s a lot of petty thieving goes on. Finders keepers and all that. Maybe Rachel took it herself – who knows?’
‘Well, Mr Willis—’ Mathieson stood up and his colleague followed suit – ‘I think that’s all you can help us with – for now. You know where you can find us – if you think of anything else you want to say.’
Simon stood up politely – although neither he nor Mathieson attempted a smile. I scuttled ahead, opening the front door and holding it for them. Simon didn’t follow us. They walked straight to their car without looking back, started the engine and drove away. Sergeant Mathieson’s colleague made a much better job of turning their car than Mrs Ivanisovic had.
As they disappeared out of the gate, Simon came out of the drawing room.
‘It’s all right,’ I said. ‘They’ve gone.’
We stared at one another – for a moment I thought Simon was going to say something, but then he hesitated as if he had thought better of it.
‘What were they talking about?’ I asked.
Simon shook his head as if he couldn’t quite believe what he was saying. ‘They’ve found a screwdriver – a small one that belonged to me – in Rachel Hewitt’s room in Halls. You’d think they’d have found it straight away – they must have searched her room when they first found her – but apparently one of the contractors found it, when they moved her desk to paint behind it – they’re redoing her room during the long vac. They moved the desk and the screwdriver had dropped behind it. It might not have been hidden – it may just have fallen down there by accident and be nothing to do with the murder at all.’
‘But how did they know it was yours?’
‘They didn’t – until today. I’d put my initials on it in marker pen – I did it with a lot of my stuff, to try and stop people pinching things.’ He gave an ironic laugh. ‘They’ve been working their way through all the students whose initials are SW and MS – they didn’t know which way up to read it.’
‘You could have said it wasn’t yours.’
‘What for?’ Simon stared at me. ‘It is mine, and it would only have made things far worse if I denied it, then someone else told them who it belonged to.’
‘I suppose so,’ I said. ‘But how did they know to find you here?’
‘They went to my parents and my parents gave them the address.’
I could tell from his tone that Simon was joining Sergeant Mathieson in the growing band of people who recognized me for a halfwit. I had forgotten that Simon’s parents knew where he was. Lucky they hadn’t wanted me. My parents would have sent them on a fine old wild-goose chase.
I tried to restore my reputation by exhibiting my practical side. ‘We’ve run out of milk, and all sorts of things,’ I said. ‘We’re going to have to go into Kington.’ Simon scarcely appeared to hear me. He was looking beyond me towards the kitchen door, almost as if he could penetrate its solid surface and see far beyond it, into the garden. ‘It would be better to get the shopping
done now,’ I persisted. ‘You can carry on working into the evening if you need to, but the shops all close at half five.’
He appeared to consider this. ‘You’re right,’ he said eventually. ‘I’ll go and tell Danny.’
TWENTY-FIVE
They say it’s grim up north, and whoever they are they’ve undoubtedly got it right this afternoon. Although barely three o’clock, it’s so dark that I need to use my headlights. The first spots of rain hit the windscreen just as I am turning into the gates of Broadoaks. Today there is no one in the grounds, which look windswept and unwelcoming under the steely sky.
On my previous visit I came empty-handed, but this time I have brought a box of chocolates – an assortment of milk and plain, because I have no idea which she prefers. I considered flowers, but there were already some in her room last time: probably fresh flowers are all part of the Broadoaks package.
As I make a dash from my parked car, holding my umbrella tilted like a shield to ward off the worst of the weather, I wonder if I ought to let someone know I am here – or just knock and enter her room. I can’t see a way of alerting anyone’s attention – there doesn’t appear to be a bell to ring – but I am rescued by the appearance of the same minion as before. Different necklace this time – some sort of pink rock chippings, strung together any old how – hideous. She takes my dripping umbrella and goes through the same routine as last time. While she’s doing this, I suddenly get it. There must be closed-circuit television cameras which enable them to intercept everyone at the door. To make the old ladies feel secure. No expense spared.
She eyes my box of chocolates doubtfully. ‘I’m afraid you’ll see a big change,’ she says. She hesitates with a hand on the knob of Mrs Ivanisovic’s door, perhaps trying to prepare me but unable to hit on the right thing to say, before she finally steps aside and holds the door open for me, as she did on my first visit.
Mrs Ivanisovic is in bed – under the covers this time. The bedclothes are up to her chest, the pastel bedspread disappearing under a broad fold of white cotton sheet which is so pristine that I assume Mrs Ivanisovic has scarcely moved since it was made up around her. She looks like a little skeleton clad in borrowed flesh, around which someone has draped clothes belonging to some other third party. Her oxygen mask has become a fixture, held in place by slim bands of pale elastic. It emits the only sound in the room – the shallow wheeze and whisper of her breathing. Her eyes are closed.
I sit in the chair beside the bed, careful not to disturb her. I am still holding the chocolates and I look around for somewhere to put them down, but the top of her bedside cabinet is cluttered with things: a jug, a water glass, a pair of spectacles, a little dispenser of sweeteners (as if she needs to worry about her weight) – all the detritus of her vanishing life.
When my own mother died it was in hospital, in an impersonal bed with metal sides that clanged when moved and an officious-looking chart clipped at its foot. The bed was separated from the rest of the ward by thin cotton curtains, a green and grey fabric which someone employed by the NHS had once mistaken for tasteful – or maybe there had been a job lot of fabric which was going very cheap. It is clear that Mrs Ivanisovic will not be subjected to these indignities. She will be permitted to expire quietly and discreetly at Broadoaks, in a room full of her own things, with a view of the garden (albeit presently obscured by torrential rain).
I sit for about ten minutes while Mrs Ivanisovic remains oblivious to my presence, listening to her breathing, which I gradually realize is mingled with the soft, slow tick of her clock. The two sounds are complementary, if always out of sync.
Eventually I stand up and pad across the room to where I can put the chocolates down on the sideboard, alongside her collection of framed photographs. The majority of the pictures are of Danny and his parents. There is one of Danny’s father as a young man and I note the strong resemblance. They have the same eyes. Dark and deep, full of laughter . . .
Mrs Ivanisovic stirs behind me. Only the slightest of movements, but I am aware of it and turn to find her eyes are open. I return to the bedside, but I don’t sit down. She is looking up at me, but in such a way that I’m not sure if she sees me.
‘It’s Katy,’ I say, quietly. ‘I’ve come to see you – like I promised.’
She nods – well, hardly that really, just a tiny movement to show she understands, recognizes who I am.
I don’t mention the chocolates. Uncertain what to say, I resume my seat and take hold of her hand. I hardly know the woman, but it doesn’t seem presumptuous. In fact it feels like the right thing to do. She welcomes this gesture with a gentle squeezing of my fingers. Her flesh feels clammy. She tries to say something, but the oxygen mask defeats her.
‘It’s okay,’ I say. ‘Don’t try to talk.’
Irritation flickers in her eyes. There is evidently something she wants to convey to me. She gestures with her free hand, which hovers like a butterfly above the bed covers.
‘You want me to bring you something? Press your buzzer for the nurse?’
Her head rolls from side to side – so a definite negative on the nurse then.
I turn to see where she seems to be pointing. ‘The photographs?’ I ask, wondering if she wants me to bring one or two across for her to see – although Lord knows, she must know every detail of them by heart. It is not the photographs however. I track my way steadily round the room, suggesting one thing after another while she shakes her head. Eventually we end up at one of the drawers in the little sideboard. She wants me to open it. I relinquish her hand reluctantly, fearing more newspaper cuttings – but what she’s after is a photo album. It is, after all, my interest in the family pictures which has inspired her. She thinks to entertain me by showing me some more.
I carry the album over to her, resting it on the bed propped up in such a way that we can both see it. I can think of worse ways of passing the afternoon. She doesn’t seem interested in the earlier pages (Danny’s primary school mug shots, interspersed with summer holiday snaps). There is evidently something further on in the album that she particularly wants me to see. When we get to the right page her hand flaps against the bedclothes. It is obvious which picture she thinks I will be interested in. It’s a shot of Danny and me holding hands, looking at each other rather than the camera. Was he really so much taller than me? I had all but forgotten. It’s a romantic kind of shot – captured spontaneously just before we turned away from one another to smile for the camera.
She starts to gesture urgently. Makes sounds I can’t understand.
‘It’s Danny and me,’ I say, trying to sound pleased.
She makes more noises. Jerks her head. I think I understand.
‘Do you want me to take the picture?’
She nods, relaxes. Closes her eyes. The whole thing has been too much effort.
I don’t want the photograph, so I make no attempt to remove it. In fact I turn the page, finding myself among some completely different subjects: cliffs and wild flowers, still in those washed-out colours which now define our world of thirty years ago.
Her eyes have opened again. She looks down at the new set of pictures, then back at me. I hurriedly turn back to the page of her choice.
‘I don’t want to spoil your album,’ I say. ‘And besides—’ an inspirational lie occurs to me – ‘I already have a copy of this picture.’
She understands now. Sinks back as if relieved. Closes her eyes again. Poor deluded woman, she doesn’t want me to lose my chance of acquiring this sentimental relic of a long-ago love. She imagines that I cherish these memories as she does. She has forgotten her question about my finding someone else – forgotten my answer. She thinks I still carry that same old torch – the beacon of love which was going to transform me into the next Mrs Ivanisovic.
I continue my perusal of the family album. There is little else to occupy me. The rain has stopped, but dense grey clouds are still chasing one another beyond the bare branches of the trees.
After a while Mrs Ivanisovic opens her eyes and gestures that she would like to begin our game of Hunt the Thimble again. She makes tiny birdlike gestures while I do the guessing. ‘The sideboard?’ ‘The window sill?’ Until we eventually settle on the drawer of the bedside cabinet.
Unlike the rest of the room, the interior of this drawer has not been kept tidy. It is a tumble of small personal items, including a crumpled tissue, a lipstick, a fat brown envelope with what look like utility bills inside it. I unpack these various items into my lap; none of them is what she seeks. I delve into the prehistoric layer. It is evidently a repository for mementos she wants to keep close. There is an ancient champagne cork and an old theatre programme. In the back corner I find a small jeweller’s box – the sort which might contain cuff links, or a pair of smart earrings. The box is covered in a dark brown fabric, worn thin at the corners. She nods at me.
I balance this box on the corner of the bedside cabinet while I carefully replace the lapful of objects I have accumulated during the search, trying to remember their order of extraction as best I can. She closes her eyes again – whether too weary to keep them open or in resignation at my pedantry I cannot tell. As I finally slide the drawer shut her breathing changes. She is taking longer-drawn-out breaths with a shudder at the end of them. She is definitely sleeping.
I pick up the little brown box – holding it in one hand, while opening it with the other. On top of a cushion of dark blue padding sits Danny’s crucifix. It catches the light – gives me an impudent wink. From far away I hear familiar laughter – see his face and hear him call my name.
TWENTY-SIX
While Simon went out to fetch Danny I took the opportunity to run up to the bathroom and remove the towel turban from around my head. I normally combed out my hair straight away, so I had not appreciated what half an hour or so of neglect could achieve. My hair had become a tangle of half-dried frizz, kinked in the places where it had been folded under the towel, as effectively as if I’d used curl papers. The only thing for it was to wet it thoroughly again. I was about to fill the wash basin, when I heard Simon bawling my name from downstairs.