Blood Relative

by David Thomas

  It felt as though I was constantly being stonewalled: first Samira Khan telling me why I could not see Mariana, now Iqbal refusing to tell me what, if anything, she had said.

  ‘But I’m her husband. I’m paying her bills,’ I said, my frustration rising.

  ‘Oh yes, Mr Crookham, that is true, but neither of those facts makes any difference to my moral and professional duty to my client. Besides which, you are a potential witness. It is a matter of some debate as to whether I should be talking to you at all, let alone describing your wife’s condition. It would not do any of us any good if there were any suggestion that we had in any way prejudiced the possibility of a fair trial.’

  I did my best to accept the position he was in. It wasn’t easy: ‘Surely you can tell me if she’s talked about me, or has any message for me?’

  ‘She has not said anything about you, or passed on any messages for you, I can tell you that much,’ Iqbal replied.

  I tried to mask the stab of disappointment with a business like approach: ‘So what happens now?’

  ‘Ah, well, the police can only hold a suspect for thirty-six hours. After that time they have to apply to the magistrate’s court for an extension and we have the chance to apply for bail, or, if it is appropriate, for the accused to be moved to a medical facility. There are always complications finding a bed and getting health authority funding, but I’m sure we can find a solution, should it ever come to that.’

  ‘If Mariana needs medical care, I’ll pay for that too. Perhaps she could be looked after in a private hospital …’

  Iqbal made a note on a pad in front of him. ‘To be honest, I am not sure about that. I will have to look into it. Some private hospitals do have secure facilities for those patients who have been sectioned. But whether they would be considered secure enough for someone accused of murder, I cannot tell you.’

  ‘When will this hearing at the magistrate’s court be, then?’

  ‘Let me see … your wife was arrested at approximately nine o’clock last night, which would mean that the hearing would naturally occur at nine tomorrow morning. I think we will know a lot more then.’

  At least something was happening and decisions would be made. But once again, it was all based on the assumption that Mariana was essentially a criminal, and I wasn’t ready to accept that.

  ‘What then?’ I asked. ‘Is there anything I can do, anything that will help my wife?’

  ‘The best thing you can do is simply to let the process take its course and leave the professionals to do the hard work. The criminal justice system does not move quickly. These matter can take months, even years to resolve. In the meantime, my advice to you, Mr Crookham, is to try to carry on in as normal a fashion as you can. It is not easy, I know. But it is for the best.’

  11

  ‘Well, to do the bloke justice, I can see his point,’ said Nick Church.

  I’d gone round to the practice out of a sense of duty. I was a senior partner. I ought to show my face at least. As I walked through the main office, trying to look purposeful and composed, I encountered for the first time something to which I was about to become very accustomed: the confused and helpless looks of people who have not got a clue what to say. I didn’t blame them. I didn’t know what I wanted to hear. As for Nick, I’d hoped he’d share my righteous indignation about Iqbal’s apparently laid-back attitude. Yet here he was, apparently taking the lawyer’s side.

  ‘I mean, face it, there’s not a lot you can do now except pay the bills and be there for Mariana. If you really think she’s innocent …’

  ‘What do you mean, “if” she’s innocent? You know Mariana. Do you think she could kill anyone?’

  I could see Nick thinking he’d have to handle me with kid gloves.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘It’s just that, you know, you’ve lost your brother and … well, no one would blame you for finding it hard to forgive her, that’s all.’

  ‘How do you know there’s anything to forgive?’

  A look of surprise crossed Nick’s face: ‘Well that’s what everyone … I mean, it just looks bad for her, I suppose.’

  ‘Yes, it does. And that’s why I’ve got to stand by her. Someone has to. Look, it’s bad enough losing Andy. I still half expect him to call up and say why don’t we have the pint we missed last night. But if I lose Mariana as well … what would I have to live for?’

  ‘Even so, Pete, you’ve got to trust the lawyers. I’m sure they’ll do the best for her. And they’re the experts. It’s like when we build a house. We’re constantly telling clients things they don’t want to hear. This is the same, only you’re the client, not the professional …’

  Yes, I was the client and now I understood how helpless that could make one feel, paying the bills for a process that was totally out of your control.

  ‘It’s hard to take, that’s all,’ I said. ‘I feel like I should be doing something, for Mariana’s sake and Andy’s.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘I don’t know … finding out what really happened, and why?’

  ‘Well, that’s the police’s job, isn’t it?’

  ‘It should be. But as far as they’re concerned they’ve got their suspect, wrapped the whole thing up and put it to bed.’

  ‘Well, they know what they’re doing, and, frankly, you don’t. You’re an architect, not a detective. You can’t go around playing Hercule Poirot. You don’t know where to begin.’

  ‘I can’t stand this, people telling me not to worry, not to get involved, just go away and carry on as if nothing has happened.’

  ‘Yes, but what could you actually do? Listen, you’re a damn good architect, so why don’t you concentrate on that? Come back to work. Like the man said, try to get some normality back in your life. It’s for the best, I’m sure.’

  ‘But it isn’t normal, is it? I can’t even imagine what normality would feel like right now …’

  ‘OK, then, forget your imagination,’ Nick snapped. ‘Just concentrate on reality, and the reality is that we’re in the shit. The phones have been ringing off the hook, clients wondering what the hell’s going on.’

  ‘I know. I had to turn my phone off, just to hear myself think.’

  He gestured me into a meeting area that was sheltered by screens from the rest of our open-plan workspace. ‘Well, here’s what you’re missing, then …’ he went on, in a quieter, almost furtive voice. ‘Some of them, the women mostly, have asked after Mariana. But a lot of them are really edgy. Any minute now we’ll get the first email threatening to pull out of a contract. And we’re going to have a bloody hard time getting any new ones, either. Not with this hanging over us. So I’m not asking you to come back just for the good of your health. I’m saying, there are twenty-odd people here with jobs on the line because of what happened last night. You owe it to them to sort this shit out.’

  ‘OK, I get it. But I’ve got to go and see my mother, tell her that Andy’s dead. When I’ve done that, I’ll try to write some kind of round-robin email to all our clients. You know, expressing confidence in Mariana’s innocence, having confidence in the justice system, meantime it’s business as usual. All right?’

  Nick gave a grudging nod. ‘It’s a start, I suppose.’

  ‘Well, it’s all I can do right now. Mariana’s in court tomorrow. I have to sort out what’s going to happen to Andy’s body. I suppose there’ll be a funeral to arrange at some point. Give me a couple of weeks. That should do it.’

  ‘Two weeks?’ he said, his voice rising. ‘It could all fall apart by then …’

  ‘Calm down. Just tell the staff and the clients that I’m taking compassionate leave. Why wouldn’t I? It’s a lot more natural than swanning round the place like nothing’s happened.’

  ‘And what if the clients start marching?’

  ‘They won’t. Not all of them. Look, Nick, most of the big-money jobs are footballers, right? So they’re all used to media aggravation. I think we’ll get more support than you
think. Plus, they all like Mariana. They’ve no reason to think badly of her.’

  ‘Except that the papers are basically saying that she’s a murderer.’

  ‘Yes, but we both know footballers hate the papers. Given a choice between believing in Mariana or believing in a bunch of reporters, what way do you think they’re going to go?’

  Nick sighed, letting some of the tension go: ‘All right … maybe …’

  ‘Good. I’ll still have my phone and my laptop. If anyone really needs me, I’ll be accessible.’

  ‘So what are you going to do? Apart from the funeral and stuff …?’

  ‘I don’t know, Nick, I really don’t. But I’ll tell you one thing for sure. I’ve bloody well got to do something.’

  12

  The home we’d found for my mother when she could no longer fend for herself was meant to be a good one. It charged accordingly. But that didn’t make it any less depressing. There were jaunty little posters on the notice-board in the front hall, announcing days out and special events; blaring televisions, volume turned up to penetrate deaf ears; a day room filled with shrivelled, snowy-haired figures, staring blankly into space. It was enough to make me want to kill myself, rather than end up anywhere like it. But this was where I’d put my own mother.

  The shaming thought struck me that I’d been trying to get my own back. Mum might have lost her mind, but she hadn’t lost the ability to make me feel inadequate. It wasn’t really about me. I understood that as an adult, even if I hadn’t as a child. To my mother, my existence was a reminder of something and someone she would much rather have forgotten: the man who got her pregnant, then left her to raise a child alone, at a time when single motherhood was still a long, shame-filled way from the acceptable, state-subsidized lifestyle choice it had since become.

  You see, Andy was actually my half-brother: the child of John Crookham, the man who had married Mum, given me his name and been the only real father-figure in my life. From the moment he was born he’d been the apple of Mum’s eye, the symbol of everything that was good, and after Dad’s death he became the living memory of the one man she’d truly loved. I’d tried frantically to earn her approval, but my best had never been enough. My A grades would be trumped by Andy’s latest poem. If I won a long-distance race, she’d say, ‘But of course your brother swims like a fish.’

  ‘You’ll never be handsome, but you’ve got a funny face,’ she said to me once, when I was fifteen, covered in spots and paralysed with self-consciousness. ‘Andrew’s got all the looks in this family, bless him.’

  The bias was so blatant that Andy and I were able to treat it as a joke. I think that’s what kept us from falling out. We just drifted into a sort of lazy, affectionate, somewhat distant acceptance of each other. We were never going to be bosom buddies. He was seven years younger than me, living at the opposite end of the country and no better at keeping in touch than I was. There didn’t seem to be any need to make any big effort to be any closer. We weren’t in any hurry.

  And now it was too late.

  As for Mum, her attitude towards us had never changed. She’d never liked Mariana, either. Just after we got engaged we invited Mum to Sunday lunch. Mariana pulled out all the stops, cooking up a storm, dressing like the perfect demure bride-to-be and doing everything she could to charm her future mother-in-law. But Mum didn’t bother to disguise her instant, visceral dislike.

  I called her the next day and asked her what the problem was. ‘There’s no problem,’ she snapped. ‘I just didn’t take to her. She’s German. That’s probably what it is. I never liked Germans.’

  Mariana was upset for a couple of days, but we were both so caught up with the excitement of falling in love that other people’s disapproval simply drew us even closer together. Over the next couple of years, as my mother’s behaviour became progressively more erratic and the rages that seem to be an inescapable part of dementia became more frequent, we looked back on that disastrous lunch as an early symptom of her problems. It seemed to demonstrate what I sincerely believed: you actually had to be mad to dislike Mariana.

  But mad people can be extraordinarily perceptive, perhaps because they say what they really think, without any self-control or inhibition. And so, as I walked down the nursing home corridor towards my mother’s room, I thought back to that lunch and wondered whether there was something my mother had sensed about Mariana, some intuition that had told her I’d picked a wrong’un.

  I shook my head. That was ridiculous. The truth was, I’d found a beautiful wife, while her favourite son was still working his way through a random assortment of short-lived relationships and drunken one-night stands. The contrast had been more than her disintegrating brain could handle.

  Mum was sitting in a chair by the window, looking out, apparently unaware that it was already dark. She didn’t recognize me, of course, but that at least was nothing personal.

  I got down on my haunches, took one of her bony, mottled, old-woman hands and as gently as I could I told her that her son, my brother, was dead.

  She heard the news without a flicker of emotion or comprehension. I wasn’t even sure whether it was worth keeping going. It felt as though I was talking to myself as I said, ‘I’m sorry, Mum. It happened at our house. I came home and Andy was lying there and there was nothing I could do. I’m so, so sorry …’

  One of the nurses passing by must have heard me because she came into the room. I could see the fight going on behind her eyes as she tried not to ask all the questions that must have been flashing across her mind.

  Her professionalism won. She leaned over my mother.

  ‘This is your son, Muriel,’ she said. ‘Your son …’

  She looked at me questioningly.

  ‘Peter,’ I said.

  ‘Your son Peter,’ the nurse said. ‘He’s got news for you.’

  My mother frowned: the first expression that had crossed her face since I’d come into her room. Then she looked at me with a depth of bafflement and confusion that I’d never encountered before, even at the darkest moments of her dementia.

  ‘Oh no, this isn’t my son. I’m sure it isn’t,’ she said. She seemed to be wracking her brain for information that would not come. Finally she said, ‘My son is Andrew. This man isn’t Andrew. This is not my son.’

  Five minutes later, I was sitting in the car, in the dark, trying to tell myself that my mother didn’t really mean it. Just for distraction, I switched my phone back on. It was time to face the clients and their people. But as I looked down the list of text messages, one name kept coming up in a repetitive, intensifying pattern that told its own desperate, grief-stricken story. It was Vickie Price, Andrew’s girlfriend for the past couple of years.

  How could I have been so stupid?

  She must have been going crazy, and it had never even occurred to me to call her. But then, I hardly knew her, either. We’d met once or twice, but only in passing. We never had family get-togethers. It wasn’t our style. But what sort of excuse was that?

  I made the call. And put my foot in it, right from the off.

  ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t get your messages. I had my phone off all day.’

  ‘Did you really need a reminder to call me?’ Vickie’s voice sounded exhausted, tearful and just a little bit drunk. ‘I’ve been living with your brother for the past two years. Didn’t you think of me at all?’

  ‘You’re right. I should have called. It’s just, the last twenty-four hours … well … it’s not been easy.’

  ‘No, well, it hasn’t exactly been a walk in the park for me, either. Do you know what it’s like, opening up the newspaper and discovering your boyfriend’s been murdered?’

  I don’t know what it was that did it: maybe the acidic tone of her voice, or just the accumulated stress of the past twenty-four hours, but I snapped right back: ‘No … do you know what it’s like, walking into your own house and finding your brother dead on the floor?’

  For the next several seconds th
e only sound was the faint, static crackle of interference on the line.

  ‘I apologize, that was out of order,’ I said.

  ‘No, well … it’s not easy for any of us, is it?’ Vickie replied, sighing with the effort of trying to be reasonable. ‘We were going to get married, you know. That’s what Andy wanted to tell you … the good news …’

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry …’ I repeated as she started crying again. ‘That’s … that’s …’

  What was it, exactly? What word could possibly suffice?

  ‘And now … and now …’ Vickie went on, squeezing her words out between the tears, ‘the church where we were going to get married … well that’s where I’ll have to bury him … Oh God, it’s so unfair! What did he ever do to you, or to Mariana? What did he do to deserve being … being cut up like that … it’s just wrong!’

  ‘Yes … yes it is … for everyone. But I just want you to know that I’ll take care of everything … all Andy’s things. And we’ll have to work out what to do about his body …’

  ‘Oh please …’ she gasped.

  ‘Look, I know, it’s horrible, and this probably isn’t a good time. But there’s never going to be a good time, is there? We just have to deal with all this … Try to get through it as best we can.’

  It suddenly struck me that I was doing precisely the same thing as Nick had done at the office: evading the heart of the issue by reducing it to sensible, unemotional practicalities. I kept doing it, too: ‘So, I’ll find out at this end what the deal is in terms of collecting him from the police, and what the best way is of getting him down to you. And when you feel ready, just give me the name of an undertaker and we’ll take it from there.’

  ‘How do you do that?’ Vickie asked.

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘How do you … how can you just talk to me about collecting the body and arranging an undertaker just like you were, I don’t know, ordering floor-tiles or something. Don’t you feel anything?’