by Jane Corry
‘Will you be there too?’ Scarlet took her hand again.
‘This is Robert’s thing, dear. But he’ll look after you.’
‘I’d rather take pictures on my own.’
‘But you’ll need to learn first. Trust me, Robert’s a good teacher. Now how about an early night? You’ve had quite a day. And you can listen to your mum’s story again.’
‘Once upon a time, there was a little girl called Scarlet. Scarlet lived in a pretty house far away from her mum. But her mum still loved her very much.’
Scarlet closed her eyes. And the funny thing was that as soon as she heard Mum’s voice, she didn’t feel scared any more.
She felt strong. Because that’s what she needed to be if she was going to help Mum escape from prison.
I love him and I hate him.
How is that possible?
I want them to find his body.
But I’m terrified too.
Note to self: Vetiver. Can be added to Roman chamomile and clary sage to instil relaxation and calm. Warning: the aroma of vetiver on its own can be very strong. Should be well diluted or blended with other oils.
21
Vicki
I want to sink to the ground with the discarded train tickets around me. Beat it with my fists. Curl up in a ball of shame. Of course, the man with the deep voice isn’t David, any more than the woman in the police station had been Tanya. I’m going mad. How could my ex-husband be on the upside of the escalator as I am going down? Yet coincidences happen. Just not to me. At least, not today.
The worst of it is that it means David is still missing. So where the hell is he? And why is it that everyone I’ve ever cared for eventually leaves me?
The other passengers are no longer staring. That crazy woman who was calling out a man’s name? They’ve already forgotten her. They’ve moved on to the next nutter in escalator land.
But I can’t. I need to know what has happened to the man I once trusted. So it’s back to Plan A.
I take the Tube to the station nearest to Kingston. Tanya knows something. I’m sure of it.
My old road – which still has a public phone box on the corner – screams nouveau riche. It’s not the kind of house I would have gone for, but David had persuaded me, and I’d wanted to keep him happy. It was too modern for me. Executive style. Diamond-paned windows which would have been all right if it wasn’t for the brown window sills the planners had insisted on. Triple garage. Wide driveway. The neighbours have a 4x4. Tanya has a little yellow Audi convertible.
I used to have an open-top too. David and I made love in it once in the early days. I’d never done that before. It made me feel naughty, but in a good way. No one would believe it now to look at me. I’m not even allowed to drive.
Twice I walk past the house. Three times. Partly through nerves and partly because I’m testing myself. Am I going to have a seizure? The last thing I want is to knock on the door and then collapse in a heap of rolling eyes and stiff limbs.
On the fourth circuit I tell myself I am looking suspicious. This is a small cul-de-sac. There are only eight houses: all the same on the surface. Only different if you look very carefully. A bit like those magazine puzzles where there are two pictures side by side and you have to circle the bits where there are three windows instead of four.
I take a deep breath and walk up the drive. ‘Our’ front door has one of those twirly black iron boot scrapers in an open porch. It’s shiny clean. My successor doesn’t strike me as the walking type. There’s also a notice informing cold callers that they will be reported. My old brass lion knocker has gone. Instead, there’s a bell which makes a tuneful sound when I press it.
Was that her choice or David’s? What kind of woman is my replacement? I hadn’t had many dealings with her apart from the odd conversation or dinner. In fact, it was only after everything had fallen apart that I’d pummelled David mercilessly for details. When precisely did the affair start? The date. The time. Where? Our house? Or the apartment in London? What was she like in bed?
In return, he’d fed me a million different soap-opera lines that answered none of these questions. I’d changed. He was scared of the person I’d become thanks to the seizures. (How convenient.) It wasn’t my fault, it was his. (So trite!) He was sorry but he’d fallen in love with someone else. (As though it was out of his control!) It happens. And so on.
If you love someone, you stay with them through thick and thin. He just wanted an excuse to run away with his new younger model. Well, actions have consequences. And this is one of them.
No one is answering, so I go round the back. It’s a beautiful day – really warm for April. The first thing I see is the fish pond. On the patio is a pair of smart green-striped canopy swing chairs and a rectangular wooden table with a candle in the middle. An outside heater. Sliding glass doors leading into the conservatory. The doors are ajar.
There’s a sunbed inside! Tanya is lying on it.
Dammit. I’m going to sneeze. She opens her eyes. ‘What the fuck …’
I’m inside before Tanya can close the patio doors on me. It’s really hot in here. An absolute suntrap.
‘Where is he?’ I say, grabbing her arms.
She pulls away. ‘If I did know where he was, I’d have thrown him out by now for playing around. Now get out of my house.’
‘When did you last see David? What kind of mood was he in?’
My husband was always in moods, although he’d kept that hidden at first.
Tanya was staring at me, hate shooting out from her black eyes. ‘What do you think you are?’ she snarls. She has tiny white teeth. A bit like a rat. ‘The police?’
That squeaky little-girl voice is really irritating me. There’s no way she’d been born with that. I can imagine her cultivating it as she grew up to snare the right kind of man.
‘I just want to clear my name,’ I say, trying to be reasonable. ‘The police are after me. I need to prove that I had nothing to do with his disappearance.’
What the hell is she doing now? Tanya has grabbed something from the top of a pretty cane chest of drawers. I recognize it immediately. It’s a wooden love spoon which Dad had bought Mum during their honeymoon in Wales. I’d brought it back with me after Dad’s death, revering it as one of Mum’s few remaining possessions. In the divorce, it must have ended up in David’s pile. I’d been looking for it for ages. How dare he? It wasn’t as though it was valuable. He must have known I’d miss it. Maybe that was the point. Now Tanya is waving it in front of me as if she is considering poking my eyes out with it. There are red blotches on her face and arms.
Distract! I used to be good at that. So I hold out the papers I’ve been keeping safe. It was my surety, I told myself. A get-out-of-jail-free card. One day I might need it. And now the day has come.
‘Did you know that our husband has been money laundering?’ I say softly.
‘ “Our” husband?’ Tanya laughs, putting down the spoon. ‘You’re deluding yourself, Vicki. I’m his wife now.’
Once a wife, always a wife. Did David’s first ex – Nicole’s mother – feel the same about me?
‘Look. He’s been buying houses for cash.’
I flourish a page from the deeds I’d come across when going through David’s study just after he’d announced he wanted to split. For a clever man, my husband could be rather stupid. Why hadn’t he hidden them better?
‘The paperwork has got you down as a co-owner every time.’
Tanya’s face goes rigid. ‘That proves nothing. It’s just business.’
‘With all these houses? I’ve got evidence to show there are eleven of them, each worth several million. What would the company want those for?’
Her eyes glare. ‘An investment.’
‘Then why not put the money in the business account? He told me that he was short of cash towards the end of our marriage.’
‘That was five years ago. Things have changed.’
It’s possible. But I don
’t believe her. Lying is an art. And I’ve learned from the masters.
‘I know a bit about money laundering, Tanya.’
‘Hah! How?’
I think of a woman I’d come across who’d been done for fraud. She used to boast that she still had a ‘hidden stash’ for when she came out.
‘You’d be surprised. But I do know that people often buy houses with cash to get rid of large quantities of dirty money. Where did it come from? What’s David been doing?’
For a minute, I think Tanya’s going to say something, but then her mouth tightens. Her face is getting redder and she seems slightly unstable. Clearly, I’ve hit a nerve.
‘Perhaps,’ I say, ‘the sensible thing is to hand this to the police.’
‘Why haven’t you done so already?’ Then she notes my expression. ‘You can’t bring yourself to shop him, can you?’
I ignore the question because the true answer would make me look like one of those pathetic divorcees who can’t get over their exes. Which I suppose I am.
‘Maybe he’s hiding to avoid being caught. Come on, Tanya, I know there’s something going on here.’
Tanya steps towards me, her face registering pure hate.
‘Don’t do anything stupid,’ I say softly, ‘or you’ll be in even more trouble.’
‘Prove it,’ she hisses, right in my face. A shudder of fear runs right through me. It’s so strong that for a minute I think I’m going to have another seizure. Then she grabs the papers out of my hand and rips them up. Pieces flutter to the ground.
‘I’ve got more copies,’ I gasp.
She gives me a shove. I fall against the piano but right myself.
Her hands seize my wrists just as I’d grabbed her arms earlier. They twist them like some spiteful schoolgirl. Two can play at that game. My nails cut into her skin.
‘Ouch,’ she screams. ‘You cow!’
She lunges at me. I step sideways, pushing her away. She falls, hitting her head against a table with a sickening crunch.
For a minute, I panic. Then my old enemy gets onto all fours and staggers to her feet. ‘Get out,’ she screams, face puce with fury. ‘Do you hear me? You haven’t heard the last of this, Vicki. Just you wait.’
22
Scarlet
January 2013
‘What do you think?’ asked Scarlet, nervously.
Robert held the print up to the light. ‘Good shade contrast. Nice angle too. Quirky. You have to look at it twice to realize what it is.’
Phew. Robert’s approval was worth a lot. He was the expert.
‘What’s it meant to be?’ asked Dee, peering over their shoulders.
‘A leaf,’ they both said in unison.
‘Really? Gosh. I see what you mean. Wow, Scarlet. That’s neat.’
A warm feeling flooded through her. Over the years, Robert had taught her so much! How to find the right subject. What speed to use. Arranging a composition. Shooting in black and white. Entering competitions. Last year’s award certificate for runner-up in Teenage Photographer of the Year was displayed in the hall, right by the front door.
Dee had insisted. ‘It’s an amazing honour,’ she’d said, flushing as if she had won it herself. ‘I’m so proud of you.’
Scarlet had hugged her back warmly but she’d felt sad, just as she always did. It was Mum whom she should be hugging. Mum who should be hanging her certificates on the wall. Mum who ought to be helping her braid her hair with the little red beads. Mum she should be living with. Mum who should be here to help celebrate Christmases and birthdays. (She’d be fifteen in the summer!)
‘Do you think it’s good enough to enter?’ asked Scarlet.
‘For this year’s award?’ Robert patted her on the shoulder. Scarlet flinched.
‘That man,’ Mum would sometimes demand when she visited. ‘He doesn’t try anything on with you, does he?’
‘Of course he doesn’t,’ Scarlet would say, glancing nervously at the social worker who always had to be with them. Her initial fears when she’d first come here, that Robert might come into her room like Mr Walters, had proved unfounded. Even so, it had taken her a long time to trust him, and she still couldn’t help shuddering if there was any physical contact, however slight.
Dee was different, though. Scarlet liked it when she hugged her. It felt warm. Good. And if she closed her eyes, she could imagine it was really her mother …
At times, Scarlet thought her heart was literally going to break – especially when Mum rang. (She had to have special permission to do this. Only ‘approved’ numbers were on her phone card.) ‘Is that my little girl?’ she’d ask, and Scarlet could feel the tears in her voice yet be unable to help because Mum was behind bars, and she had to live with Dee and Robert. Kind as they were, it wasn’t the same. No one else at school was in a foster home. It was all so different from the horrible time she’d had at the Walters’. But at least since she’d started to gain recognition through her photographs, her classmates had been much nicer and actually admiring. She still didn’t have a special friend, but Scarlet didn’t need one. All she wanted was Mum.
The first year had been the worst. Mum had been taken into rehab then. Scarlet hadn’t been allowed to see her much because of some ‘bitch’ in charge of the prison who had put her on ‘restricted visiting’. But when they did let her, Mum didn’t ask her anything about school or what it was like with Dee and Robert. All she wanted to know was whether Scarlet had brought her some weed. ‘Why not, you silly girl?’
Then Mum would start screaming and shouting so that the officers took her away, leaving Scarlet in tears.
It was Dee who had comforted her when the social worker brought her home. Dee who sat her on her knee even though she’d been a big girl of nine then. Dee who told her that her own parents had done drugs too and how they could really mess up your brain. ‘Your mum loves you,’ she’d sighed. ‘She just needs time to get cleaned up.’
Her foster mother had been right. In the last couple of years, Mum had got her privileges back. This meant that Scarlet was allowed to visit more often. Mum stopped pestering her for drugs but she was still thin, and her lovely blonde hair was lank and greasy. She didn’t smell the same either. It was hard to say what she did smell of. But it wasn’t patchouli. Mum had laughed when she’d asked her why she didn’t wear it any more. ‘It’s not on the canteen list, love.’
When Scarlet had asked what that meant, Mum had explained that you could only buy things like shampoo or toothpaste that were on this special list that had nothing to do with a real canteen or café. But you had to have money to get what you wanted. Mum’s padmate had loads of money which her family sent in. But Mum only got a few quid from doing jobs in the prison like cleaning or ironing.
That’s when Scarlet started entering photos for competitions through Robert’s photographic magazines that came in the post every month. She’d won £50 for the first one. ‘Are you sure you want to give it to your mum?’ asked Dee.
Of course she was!
‘I don’t know if it’s allowed, love.’
So she’d asked the social worker, who ‘made enquiries’ and found out that they could pay it into a special account which the prison would then give to Mum to spend on canteen items. When Scarlet visited next, Mum immediately asked if she’d won any more competitions. ‘Not yet, but Robert says I show promise …’
Mum’s eyes had narrowed. ‘I can’t buy my fags on promise. You’d better get snapping, my girl. Don’t you want to help me?’
It was almost, Scarlet told herself, as if prison was making her mother into a different person. Someone who was harder and even selfish at times. Then Mum would go the other way, especially at Christmas and birthdays, when she’d cry down the phone and say she wished she could afford to send her nice things instead of the crappy purple felt handbag she’d made in the prison craft class.
‘I don’t want any presents,’ Scarlet would say. ‘I just want you.’
That made them
both cry even more.
At school, Scarlet put on a brave front, just like Mum told her. When the other kids had boasted about what they’d done in the Christmas holidays and how they’d been to visit grandparents, she just kept quiet. When she got home, she’d go straight up to her room and talk to Mum’s picture: the same one that Robert had mended, which she now kept next to her bed because it was safer. ‘It won’t be for ever,’ she would say. And the little girl in the red spotty dress seemed to understand.
But gradually Mum had started to be more cheerful. ‘Not long now, if my parole goes well.’ Then she’d rub her eyes with her hands. ‘I could have been out of this sodding place if I hadn’t started using again.’
‘Using what?’
‘It doesn’t matter. I’m so sorry, love. I really am.’
Scarlet wondered if it had something to do with the big woman with the red heart tattoos on her neck who always sat near them in the visiting hall, waiting for family who never turned up. On one terrible day, the woman had thrown a cup of coffee at them. It had only just missed.
‘Bastard!’ Mum had screamed. ‘Try hurting my little girl again and I’ll fucking kill you.’ Two officers came racing up, taking her and the coffee woman by the arms. ‘Let me stay with my daughter,’ Mum had yelled, kicking and fighting as they tried to take her out of the room. Furiously, she spat at one of the guards. ‘It’s bad enough that the bitch cut back our visits. You lot are supposed to help families stay together – not divide a mother and her child. How are we meant to have a proper relationship?’
The social worker – a new one – who had brought Scarlet back from the prison that day and had stayed for a cuppa, shook her head. ‘Shocking. I’ve never seen anything like it.’
Scarlet was so upset that she began to get her old nightmares all over again. ‘Shhh,’ soothed Dee, who would come into her room when this happened and hold her against her shoulder, patting her back. It was so comforting. ‘I’ve always wanted a daughter like you,’ she murmured. If Scarlet closed her eyes, she could almost imagine she was a child again and that it was Mum who was soothing her instead. Yet in the morning, Scarlet would always feel guilty. It was Mum who was her real mum. Then she’d go really quiet and not want to talk to Dee.