Sophie fetched her sunglasses and embarked on a proper search, covering the drive and several hundred yards of road before working her way from the front round to the back garden. The heat pricked her eyes and burnt her gums and throat, reducing her already suspect efforts at mewing to something even less convincing. But she licked her lips and pressed on. The animal simply had to be found.
Behind some shrubbery on the garden’s furthest perimeter, she came upon a small Wendy House-style shed, ghoulish, industrial-sized cobwebs dangling from its low ceiling like loose knitting. Inside, it was hot enough to bake bread, no resting place for any creature, let alone a cat with Dido’s extravagant fur covering, Sophie observed, hastily withdrawing. The shed produced one worthwhile discovery, though, in the form of a tank and a tap hidden in the same cluster of shrubs. One cautious half-turn of the tap and Sophie was rewarded by the sight of bubbling fountains of water breaking out all over the lawn, fizzing and spurting as they gathered power.
She watched, transfixed, elated. The grass wouldn’t die! And she did care, she really did, she realized, skipping through the jets of water to continue her search in the stretch of woodland separating the house from the lake. The cat would be in the cool of the trees, of course it would. Or maybe up a tree. Possibly even stuck up a tree – yes, that made sense. Sophie tipped her head back, pushing her legs through the thin straggles of undergrowth, enjoying the springy feel of the forest’s pine-needled floor under her flip-flops. This is good, she thought. This is enjoyable.
But then a branch snapped and she spun like a cornered animal herself, her pulse wild. There was nothing there. Nobody. Just the endless dark towers of the trees, and the buzz of insects and tricks of lights where sun dappled shade. Sophie’s heart thumped as she checked and rechecked her surroundings, trying now to see behind the lift of every leaf, the rustle of every branch. It had to have been some harmless scuttling creature – possibly even the cat, she told herself, labouring to filter out the panic. Instead, it grew worse, a dread, the like of which she had never known, reaching through her ribs to squeeze her heart, taking her back, it seemed, to every fear she had ever known – a maniacal demon in a film when she was a child, Tamsin’s rigid, trusting, twisted face as she fought and failed to breathe, her baby daughter falling like a stone, the tom’s mashed tiger fur stuck to the road. It was like a fast-forward of horrors, slowing only when it reached the boy-intruder, in his mud-encrusted trainers, the laces trailing and stiff with dirt.
Sophie had recalled the events of the afternoon countless times, but this was different, deeper, as if she was living it again, smelling the faint, stale odour of his skin, seeing the flecks of black in his bright brown eyes. Bad things happened when you least expected them, that was the awfulness. They happened when you felt safe. She had been sorting laundry, standing at the over-stuffed airing cupboard, so maddeningly positioned on the turn in the stairs. The first she had known of anything amiss was when Andrew called for her to come down.
Except, no, she hadn’t known, or guessed from his voice, that anything was wrong. She had said, ‘Hang on,’ and finished putting the pillowcases on top of the sheets, trying to compress them next to a pagoda of clothes without ruining all her hard work at the ironing board. She had said, ‘Hang on,’ and then gone downstairs to the kitchen to find the cold tap running and nobody there. Challenged with regard to his presence in the garden, the boy had asked for a drink, Andrew explained later, to her and then to the police. He had asked for water. So Andrew had invited him inside.
When Andrew called her name again, Sophie had traced him to the dining room. Andrew was sitting on one of the chairs and the boy was standing behind him. As she entered, the boy reached into his pocket and pulled out a small knife, clicking it open and pointing it in the direction of Andrew’s neck.
Sophie found that she had shuffled backwards against a tree. It felt solid, cool, reliable – a sentinel watching her back. It felt the best place to be, in the circumstances, with the echo of the snapping branch in her ears – and this unlooked-for, unwanted onrush of the past it seemed to have released, washing up details that had never seemed to matter before. Like how young and small – how assailable – their assailant had looked, clearly still so much more of a child than a man, and so visibly slight beside Andrew’s six-foot-two frame, folded obediently into the dining-room chair.
And there was the fact of Andrew calling for her – Sophie hadn’t really thought that through before, at least not the timing of it – which was what she found so overwhelming now, with the ridges of the bark digging into her spine. Had the boy produced the knife before Andrew called? Or had it been afterwards, when she entered the dining room? Why wasn’t she sure? Why did it matter?
Sophie dug her nails through the tree’s matting of ivy, feeling for the comforting crust of the bark, closing her eyes as she tried to think beyond the fear, still washing through her in waves. It mattered because before the knife Andrew might have done something. It mattered because Andrew had invited the boy in, allowed a bad situation to develop and then summoned her into the thick of it.
‘Watch out!’
The shout ricocheted her back to the present with all the impact of a gunshot. She felt a fingernail rip as she clung on and twisted round. A shadowy figure was lumbering towards her through the trees … Sophie pressed her eyes shut, moaning softly.
‘Mrs Chapman – Sophie – I’m sorry to butt in, but you should get right away from there.’
It was the neighbour, Carter, in dark shorts and a black T-shirt, stretched tight over his belly. Sophie blinked stupidly, embarrassed, but still too shaken to move.
‘Poison ivy?’ Carter wheezed, dropping his hands to his knees to catch his breath. ‘This place is crawling with it. Seriously …’ He stepped towards her, placing one sandalled foot carefully among the undergrowth and offering his hand. ‘I’m sorry if I alarmed you, but you should get right away from there now. Although I’m afraid it might already be too late,’ he added, shaking his head as Sophie at last allowed herself to be led to a clearer patch of ground. ‘Look, right there.’ He pointed to the greenery entwining the body of her tree. ‘Clusters of three, no thorns, those white flowers – I was taught to look out for that as a kid. We’re going to have to get you washed up – and fast.’
‘Washed up?’ Sophie echoed, her mind still reeling.
‘Yeah – and with soap. You gotta scrub like no tomorrow – not just a jump in my pool, though you look like you could do with that too.’ Carter started to chuckle but checked himself when the Englishwoman set off back towards the house without a word, her eyes fixed open, like she had seen a ghoul or taken too much of something illegal – or perhaps prescribed, he mused, his mind darting to a battle Nancy had fought for a time, with substances channelled to her between doctors and drugstores.
‘I was looking for the cat … for Dido,’ Sophie muttered, when he caught up with her, the embarrassment settling in properly now. He was nimble in his sandals, she noticed, in spite of the swell of his belly, as evident as a pregnancy in the too-tight black T-shirt. ‘She’s not been around for a couple of days and I was worried. This poison ivy, what will it do?’ She thrust out her arms for a cursory examination and then dropped them back to her sides.
Andrew had called her before the knife appeared. That was the thing. The boy had only produced it when Andrew had succeeded in summoning her. He had held it awkwardly too, unconvincingly, although that had done nothing to stop her scrambling to do his bidding – cash from every nook she could think of – all the while issuing silent prayers of gratitude that the girls were safely bowing their instruments at a parish hall in Sheen, rehearsing for a fund-raiser that evening. Fauré’s Requiem, to help rebuild a church spire. The tickets had been sticking out of Andrew’s breast pocket – Sophie remembered that too, suddenly, along with the thump of fear it had caused her, as if the girls themselves, rather than evidence of the concert, were half in view.
Must be arou
nd a week gone and still the woman’s arms were pale, Carter observed, although not white like the husband’s. The colouring was because they were British, he knew, although it had occurred to him during the brief encounter on the day of their arrival that there was something deeply washed out about the Stapletons’ temporary tenants, like once-vivid book jackets or paintings drained to insipidity by daylight. ‘Poison ivy is a bummer,’ he explained, as they walked, hoping to break the intensity of her expression. ‘It contains this stuff called urushiol, which is toxic and invisible. That’s the deal with the soap – it’s the only way to get rid of it. Even so I’m afraid you’re going to have rashes on your hands and legs by tomorrow, which will itch like hell and maybe even blister and weep.’
‘Weep?’
‘You know … like when the blisters burst?’
‘Oh, I see. Well, thanks.’ They had reached the garden boundary at an angle that allowed a glimpse of his house through the trees: white with blue shutters and twice the size of the Stapletons’. Sophie squinted, making out a low white picket fence and what looked like the surround of the swimming-pool.
‘You should hurry. And wash your clothes too – the slightest trace of that urushiol and you’re cooked. Some say human urine works the best but that’s not my experience.’ He tried a grin, which was rewarded by a smile – the first he’d seen. A pretty girl, once, he noted, real pretty, and still not bad either with the thick wheaten hair, which looked like it still grew that colour of its own accord, and such a tall, slim figure – too slim in his view, though Nancy, battling with her weight-loss programmes, would be sure to disagree.
‘Urine? Really?’ She was still smiling. ‘You’ve tried it?’
‘As a kid – sure. You try anything as a kid, don’t you? Hey, come over for a swim once you’re done … you and your husband.’
‘Andrew’s not here.’
‘Hell, just you, then. Nancy would love that. We can offer you a soda or tea or whatever the hell you guys drink at this time of day. And we can have a look for the princess too, if you like.’
‘Thank you, but …’
Carter watched her struggling with the decision. Nancy was at an audition and the cat never came near them. Their old dog Buz saw to that, not deliberately – he was docile and deaf – but by the mere fact of his presence. So he was being deceiving, but only in a good way, Carter reasoned, since he was in the mood for company and this woman looked like she could do with some cheering up too, unless he had mistaken the expression behind the big sunglasses and tree-hugging was a regular hobby of hers back home.
‘The fact is, I’m not a great one for swimming, and if I was, I could always use the lake.’
‘The lake?’ Carter released a snort of amazement. ‘Well, I guess you could, but nobody swims in that – it’s kinda cold and real muddy round the edges and normally just used for boating and looking at and, besides, it’s quite a hike and a hazardous one at that,’ he concluded, with some triumph, nodding at her hands. ‘Are you feeling anything yet?’
‘I’m not sure.’ Sophie studied her fingers, which looked pinkish anyway through her dark lenses.
‘Hell, what am I doing yakking like this? Go this instant and get washed up – with soap, remember? They say you have fifteen minutes and I reckon you’ve already used ten. And then come by for that swim, okay? I – we shall expect you momentarily. Don’t bother with the front entrance – just come right around the side. And no need to bring a towel, we’ve got plenty,’ he added, striding off before she could compose a refusal.
5
Beth raised her leg and tried, gingerly, to circle her foot. Five days on and the swelling was half its original, horrible watermelon proportions, but the bruising was still a rich blue lake, fringed with pink, red, violet – and a hint of yellow, too, this morning, she observed grimly, carefully lowering her ankle back onto the cushion that William had thoughtfully provided for her. He had brought her a cup of coffee too, holding his smeary butter knife out of the way as he paused to plant a tender kiss on her forehead before rushing back to the kitchen. He was making a picnic and had paid an early visit to the supermarket to prepare, taking Alfie with him and shouting at the elder two through their bedroom doors to be breakfasted and ready on his return. They hadn’t been, even though Beth, hobbling her way down to the sofa, had banged on both bedroom doors with her crutches.
After the shopping trip the house had pulsed with noise – yelling, feet thundering, the play-fighting that always got out of control. Beth had breathed a sigh of relief when the door finally slammed, vibrating in the silence. They were off to yet more cricket, this time to watch it at a place called Lords, which Harry had gleefully explained had nothing to do with the Houses of Parliament. They had a thing now, her and Harry, ever since the aftermath of her ridiculous accident in the coffee shop. Embarrassed, surrounded by well-intentioned strangers gathering up her things, offering her cups of water, Beth had almost wept with relief at the sight of her stepson striding in from the street, shaking the rain from his hair, looking so sweetly anxious after her phone call. Smelling of smoke, but with no sign of his unsavoury-looking companion, Harry had half carried her to a taxi and then waited with remarkable patience during the drawn-out business of getting X-rays and doctors’ verdicts in the Accident and Emergency department of a nearby hospital – all performed for free, which had seemed to Beth remarkable, but done nothing to impress Harry, who said the NHS was crap and full of bugs that killed people. It was only when they were finally on their way home, when she had recouped some of her wits and resilience (a week on crutches, the last doctor had advised, which meant the dearly bought yellow shoes wouldn’t get an outing for a while but she would at least be fit for the trip up north), that she had ventured to remark that she had caught sight of him in the street after they had separated and how sore William would be to know his eldest son had taken up smoking.
Harry had scowled at the rain streaming down the taxi window. ‘Yeah, well, he can talk, can’t he?’
‘Adults usually know what’s best even if they can’t always manage it themselves. Besides, he’s trying hard, your father, with the nicotine gum.’
Harry snorted.
‘What concerns me more,’ she had pressed on, ‘is that I gave you money to buy sneakers.’
‘Here. Have it back.’ Harry had started plucking notes out of his trouser pockets – a five and a ten.
‘I don’t want it back. It was a gift. It’s just … Look, Harry, I’m okay with most things except …’ Beth had paused, hoping he would drag his gaze from the taxi window. ‘Except being taken for a ride. The point being that if you had wanted to meet your girlfriend you should have said straight out. I could have gone to the Victoria and Albert Gallery or somewhere. Then we’d all have been happy, wouldn’t we? And maybe I wouldn’t have sprained this darned ankle.’
‘Dad wanted you and me to spend the day together, didn’t he?’ Harry had mumbled, still talking into the hand on which he was resting his averted head. ‘So he’d have been pissed off about me doing anything else. And now he’s going to be really pissed off.’
‘Not necessarily,’ Beth had ventured, gaining his full attention at last.
She still felt a small surge of pride at how she had handled the conversation, treating the seventeen-year-old like the young adult he was, explaining the error of his ways but then securing his affections by promising to keep the minor episode of his deceit entirely to herself. On getting home, she had – loudly and publicly – sung Harry’s praises to William, who had responded by letting his eldest out three nights in a row without a curfew, which meant the boy looked like a walking ghost and his middle brother was too jealous to speak to him, but then, as Beth had spent a lifetime reasoning to herself, few things in any kid’s life were ever perfect.
The day was grey – again – but not raining. Beth read the papers and her book, a disappointingly dull yarn about a quirky female detective, until the sofa felt lumpy. Shifting on
to her side, she flicked the television on and tried to memorize a lean, wiry-haired chef’s demonstration of how to make the perfect cheese soufflé. Her appetite stirred, she hopped into the kitchen and ate the croissant she had promised herself she wouldn’t touch – even though William had fought the boys off it on her behalf – followed by a wedge of delicious crumbly white cheese threaded through with diced apricots. English cheese, like English bread, was proving a revelation; and all fruit was good, she reasoned, as was dairy, in sensible quantities.
Breaking off a hunk of the cheese that was not remotely sensible, and squeezing it into a soft granary bap, she then laboured upstairs with the crutches, stopping to take bites of her snack and to poke at items of laundry strewn along the stairs and landing. She found the messiness of William’s children astonishing. She was not to clear up after them, he had thundered several times – loud enough to shame the boys into spurts of action – but the mess would build up again, within minutes, it seemed, and Beth, for whom orderliness was integral to sanity, was finding it increasingly difficult not to mind.
Having planned the trip upstairs to seek diversion on her laptop, plugged in next to Andrew Chapman’s pile of bedside books, Beth found herself hobbling first into the passageway bathroom that housed a weighing scale. Leaning the crutches up against the wall, she stepped warily into position, only to fall against the toilet cistern with a howl. Seven pounds. Oh, God, seven pounds in only ten days.
Before I Knew You Page 7