The Four Last Things

by Taylor, Andrew

  Nothing went right at home, either. Michael had retreated further into himself since the squabble on the way back from church and the subsequent discovery that Sunday lunch had turned into a burnt offering. There were no open quarrels but the silences between them grew longer. It was possible, Sally thought, that the problem had nothing to do with her – he might be having a difficult time at work.

  ‘Everything’s fine,’ he replied when she asked him directly, and she could almost hear the sound of the drawbridge rising and the portcullis descending.

  Sally persevered. ‘Have you seen Oliver lately?’

  ‘No. Not since his promotion.’

  ‘That’s great. When did it happen?’

  ‘A few weeks back.’

  Why hadn’t Michael told her before? Oliver Rickford had been his best man. Like Michael, he had been a high-flier at Hendon police college. They had not worked together since they had been constables, but they still kept in touch.

  ‘Why’s he been made up to inspector and not you?’

  ‘He says the right things in committee meetings.’ Michael looked at her. ‘Also he’s a good cop.’

  ‘We must have him and Sharon over for supper. To celebrate.’ Sally disliked Sharon. ‘Tuesdays are usually a good evening for me.’

  Michael grunted, his eyes drifting back to the newspaper in front of him.

  ‘I suppose we should ask the Cutters sometime, too.’

  ‘Oh God.’ This time he looked up. ‘Must we?’

  Their eyes met and for an instant they were united by their shared dislike of the Cutters. The dislike was another of Sally’s problems. As the weeks went by, she discovered that Derek Cutter preferred to keep her on the sidelines of parish work. He made her feel that wearing a deacon’s stole was the clerical equivalent of wearing L-plates. She suspected that in his heart of hearts he was no more a supporter of women clergy than Michael’s Uncle David. At least David Byfield made his opposition perfectly clear. Derek Cutter, on the other hand, kept his carefully concealed. She attributed her presence in his parish to expediency: the archdeacon was an enthusiastic advocate of the ordination of women, and Derek had everything to gain by keeping on the right side of his immediate superior. He liked to keep on the right side of almost everyone.

  ‘Lovely to see you,’ Derek said to people when he talked to them after a service or at a meeting or on their doorsteps. ‘You’re looking blooming.’ And if he could, he would pat them, young or old, male or female. He liked physical contact.

  ‘It’s not enough to love each other,’ he wrote in the parish magazine. ‘We must show that we do. We must wear our hearts on our sleeves, as children do.’

  Derek was fond of children, though he preferred to look resolutely on the sunny side of childhood. This meant in effect that his benevolent interest was confined to children under the age of seven. Children grew up quickly in Kensal Vale and the area had an extensive population of little criminals. The picture of him in the Parish Room showed him beaming fondly at a photogenic baby in his arms. In his sermon on Sally’s second Sunday at St George’s he quoted what was evidently a favourite text.

  ‘Let the children come to me, Jesus told his disciples. Do not try to stop them. For the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Mark ten, fourteen.’

  There should be more to being a vicar, Sally thought, than a fondness for patting people, a sentimental attachment to young children and a range of secular skills that might have earned him a decent living in public relations or local government.

  Sally knew that she was being unfair to Derek. As an administrator he was first class. The parish’s finances were in good order. The church was well-respected in the area. There was a disciplined core congregation of over a hundred people. As a parish, St George’s had a sense of community and purpose: Derek deserved much of the credit for this. And some of the credit must also be due to his wife. The Cutters, as Derek was fond of telling people, were a team.

  Margaret Cutter was a plump woman who looked as if she had been strapped into her clothes. She had grey hair styled to resemble wire wool. Her kindness was the sort that finds its best expression in activity, preferably muscular. She invited Sally for coffee at the Vicarage on the Tuesday after Sally’s first service at St George’s. They sat in a small, overheated sitting room whose most noteworthy features were the bars on the window and the enormous photocopying machine behind the sofa. On top of the television set stood a toy rabbit with soft pink fur and a photograph of Derek and Margaret on their wedding day. Sally thought that she looked older than her husband.

  ‘Just us two girls,’ Margaret said, offering Sally a plate of digestive biscuits, which proved to be stale. ‘I thought it would be nice to have a proper chat.’ The chat rapidly turned into a monologue. ‘It’s the women who are the real problem. You just wouldn’t believe the way they throw themselves at Derek.’ The tone was confiding, but the dark eyes flickered over Sally as if measuring her for a shroud. ‘Of course, he doesn’t see it. But isn’t that men all over? They’re such fools where women are concerned. That’s why they need us girls to look after them.’ Here she inserted a pause which gave Sally ample time to realize that, astonishing as it might seem, Margaret was warning her that Derek was off limits as a potential object of desire. ‘I knew when I married him that he was going to be a full-time job. I used to be a lecturer, you know, catering was my subject; they begged me to stay but I said, “No, girls, I only wish I could but I have to think of Derek now.” Well, that’s marriage, isn’t it, for better or for worse, you have to give it top priority or else you might as well not do it.’ She stroked her own forearm affectionately. ‘You must find it very hard, Sally, what with you both working and having the kiddie to think of as well. Still, I expect your Lucy’s grown used to it, eh? Such a sweet kiddie. In some ways it’s a blessing that Derek and I haven’t had children. I honestly don’t think we would have had time to give them the love and attention they need. But that reminds me, I promised to give you Carla Vaughan’s phone number. I must admit she’s not to everyone’s taste, but Derek thinks very highly of her. He sees the best in everyone, Derek does. You do realize that Carla’s a single parent? Two little kiddies, with different fathers and I don’t think she was married to either. Still, as Derek says, who are we to cast the first stone? Did he mention she likes to be paid in cash?’

  The following day, Wednesday, Sally took Lucy to meet Carla. She lived in a small terraced house which was almost exactly halfway between St George’s and Hercules Road. Half West Indian and half Irish, she had an enormous mop of red curly hair which she wore in a style reminiscent of a seventeenth-century periwig. The house seethed with small children and the noise was formidable. Carla’s feet were bare, and she was dressed in a green tanktop and tight trousers which revealed her sturdy legs and ample behind; she was not a woman who left much to the imagination.

  Carla swept a bundle of magazines from one of the chairs. ‘Do you want a Coke or something? And what about you, Lucy?’

  Lucy shook her head violently. She kept close to her mother and stared round-eyed at the other children, who ignored her. Carla took two cans from the refrigerator and gave one to Sally.

  ‘Saves washing up. You don’t mind, do you?’ She stared with open curiosity at the dog collar. ‘What should I call you, by the way? Reverend or something?’

  ‘Sally, please. What a lovely big room.’

  ‘One of my fellas did it for me. He was a builder. I told him to knock down all the walls he could without letting the house fall down. And when he’d finished I gave him his marching orders. I’m through with men. If you ask me, you’re better off without them.’ She leaned forward and lowered her voice slightly. ‘Sex. You can keep it. Mind you, men have their uses when you need a bit of DIY.’

  Sally glanced round the room, ostensibly admiring the decor. She noticed that most of the horizontal surfaces held piles of washing, disposable nappies, toys, books, empty sweet packets and video tapes. T
he back door was open and there was a sunlit yard beyond with a small swing and what looked like a sandpit. Sally thought that the place was fundamentally clean under the clutter and that the children seemed happy; she hoped this was not wishful thinking.

  While she and Carla discussed the arrangements, Lucy feigned an interest in the twenty-four-inch television set, which was glowing and mumbling in a recess where there had once been a fireplace; she pretended to be absorbed in an episode from Thomas the Tank Engine, a programme she detested.

  ‘Why don’t you leave her for an hour or two? Trial run, like.’

  Sally nodded, ignoring the sudden surge of panic. Lucy lunged at her arm.

  ‘You just go, honey.’ Carla detached Lucy with one hand and gave Sally a gentle push with the other. ‘Have you ever made gingerbread robots with chocolate eyes?’ she asked Lucy.

  The crying stopped for long enough for Lucy to say, ‘No.’

  ‘Nor have I. And we won’t be able to unless you can help me find the chocolate.’

  Sally slipped out of the house. She hated trusting Lucy to a stranger. But whatever she did, she would feel guilty. If you had to list the top ten attributes of modern motherhood, then guilt would be high up there in the top three.

  Sally Appleyard could not say when she first suspected that she was being watched. The fear came first, crawling slowly into her life when she was not looking, masquerading as a sense of unease. Her dreams filled with vertiginous falls, slowly opening doors and the sound of footsteps in empty city streets.

  Rightly or wrongly she associated the change in the emotional weather with the appearance in mid-September of Frank Howell’s feature in the Evening Standard. In his idiosyncratic way the balding cherub had done St George’s proud. Here, Sally was interested to learn, was the real Church of England. Two photographs accompanied the piece: one of Derek equipped with dog collar, denim jacket and Afro-Caribbean toddler; the other of Sally. In the text Howell described the incident at Sally’s first service.

  ‘Pity he had to choose St George’s,’ Michael said when he saw the article.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because now all the nutters will know you’re there.’

  She laughed at him but his words lingered in her memory. There was no shortage of rational explanations for what she felt. She was tired and worried. It was not unnatural, particularly for a woman, to equate a sense of unease with being watched. She knew that a solitary and reasonably attractive woman was vulnerable in parts of the parish. To a certain type of male predator her profession might even add to her allure. Perhaps Michael had inadvertently planted the idea in her mind. Besides, to some extent she really was under observation: she was still a novelty in Kensal Vale: the woman with the dog collar was someone to stare at, to point out, sometimes to laugh at, and occasionally to abuse.

  She-devil. Blasphemer against Christ. Apostate. Impious bitch. Whore of Babylon. Daughter of Satan.

  One evening near the end of the month she was later home than expected. Michael was watching from the window.

  ‘Where the hell were you?’ he demanded as he opened the door to her. ‘Do you know what time it is?’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she snapped, her mind still full of the room she had left, with the bed, the people, the smells and the chattering television and the view from a high window of Willesden Junction beneath an apocalyptic western sky. ‘Someone was dying and there wasn’t a phone.’

  ‘You should have sent someone out, then. I’ve phoned the Cutters, the hospitals, the police.’

  His face crumpled. She put her arms around him. They clung together by the open door. Michael’s hands stroked her back and her thighs. His mouth came down on hers.

  She craned her head away. ‘Michael –’

  ‘Hush.’

  He kissed her again and this time she found herself responding. She tried to blot out the memory of the room with the high window. One of his hands slipped round to the front of her jeans. She shifted back to allow his fingers room to reach the button of the waistband.

  ‘Mummy,’ Lucy called. ‘I’m thirsty.’

  ‘Oh God.’ Michael drew back, grimacing at Sally. ‘You go and see her, love. I’ll get the drink.’

  The following evening, he came home with a personal alarm and a mobile phone.

  ‘Are you sure I need all these?’

  ‘I need you to have them.’

  ‘But the cost. We –’

  ‘Bugger the cost, Sal.’

  She smiled at him. ‘I’m no good with gadgets.’

  ‘You will be with these.’

  She touched his hand. ‘Thank you.’

  The alarm and the phone helped at least for a time. The fact that Carla could now contact her at any time was also reassuring. But the fear returned, a familiar devil. Feeling watched was a part of it. So too was a sense of the watcher’s steady, intelligent malevolence. Behind the watching was a fixed purpose.

  But there was nothing, or very little, to pin it to. The evidence was skimpy, almost invisible, and capable of innocent interpretations: a small, pale van which one afternoon followed her car round three successive left turns; someone in a long raincoat walking down Hercules Road late at night and glancing up at the windows of the flat; warm breath on the back of her neck in a crowd swirling down the aisle of a supermarket; Lucy’s claim that a man had winked at her in the library when she went there with Carla and the other children. As to the rest, what did it amount to but the occasional shiver at the back of the neck, the sense that someone might be watching her?

  To complicate matters, Sally did not trust her instincts. She couldn’t be sure whether the fear was a response to something in the outside world or merely a symptom of an inner disturbance. This was nothing new: since her teens, she had trained herself to be wary of her intuitions partly because she did not understand them and partly because she knew they could be misleading. She lumped them together with the uncomfortably vivid dreams and the moments when time seemed to stand still. They were interesting and disturbing: but there was nothing to show that they were more than freak outbreaks of bioelectrical activity.

  The scepticism was doubly necessary at present: she was under considerable strain, in a state which might well induce a certain paranoia. In the end it was a question of degree. Carrying a rape alarm was a sensible precaution against a genuine danger: acting as if she were a potential terrorist target was not.

  In November, leaves blew along the pavements, dead fireworks lined the gutters, and mists smelling of exhaust fumes and decaying vegetables softened the outlines of buildings. In November, Uncle David came to lunch.

  The ‘Uncle’ was a courtesy title. David Byfield was Michael’s godfather. He had been a friend of his parents and his connection with Michael had survived their deaths and the cooling of his godson’s religious faith. An Anglo-Catholic, he was often addressed as ‘Father Byfield’ by those of the same persuasion. The November lunch in London had become a regular event. In May the Appleyards went to Cambridge for a forbiddingly formal return fixture at the University Arms.

  This Saturday was the worst yet. It began badly with an emergency call from Derek, who had gone down with toothache and wanted Sally to take a wedding for him. Sally abandoned the cooking and Lucy to Michael. Neither the service nor the obligatory appearance at the reception did much for her self-esteem. The bride and groom were disgruntled to see her rather than Derek, and the groom’s mother asked if the happy couple would have to have a proper wedding afterwards with a real clergyman.

  When Sally returned to Hercules Road she found the meal over, the sink full of dirty plates, the atmosphere stinking of David’s cigarettes and Lucy in tears. Averting his eyes from her dog collar, David stood up to shake hands. Lucy chose this moment to announce that Daddy was an asshole, an interesting new word she had recently picked up at Carla’s. Michael slapped her leg and Lucy’s tears became howls of anguish.

  ‘You sit down,’ Michael told Sally. ‘I’ll deal with her
.’ He towed Lucy away to her room.

  David Byfield slowly subsided into his chair. He was a tall, spare man with prominent cheekbones and a limp due to an arthritic hip. As a young man, Sally thought, he must have been very good-looking. Now he was at least seventy, and a lifetime of self-discipline had given his features a harsh, almost predatory cast; his skin looked raw and somehow thinner than other people’s.

  ‘I’m so sorry not to have been here for lunch,’ Sally said, trying to ignore the distant wails. ‘An unexpected wedding.’

  David inclined his head, acknowledging that he had heard.

  ‘The vicar had to go to casualty. Turned out to be an abscess.’ Why did she have to sound so bright and cheery? ‘Has Lucy been rather a handful?’

  ‘She’s a lively child. It’s natural.’

  ‘It’s a difficult age,’ Sally said wildly; all ages were difficult. ‘She’s inclined to play up when I’m not around.’

  That earned another stately nod, and also a twitch of the lips which possibly expressed disapproval of working mothers.

  ‘I hope Michael has fed you well?’

  ‘Yes, thank you. Have you had time to eat, yourself?’

  ‘Not yet. There’s no hurry. Do smoke, by the way.’

  He stared at her as if nothing had been further from his mind.

  ‘How’s St Thomas coming along?’

  ‘The book?’ The tone reproved her flippancy. ‘Slowly.’