Hold Back the Night

by Hold Back the Night (retail) (epub)

  The police are still waiting for Lucy to be released, so they can charge her with her sister’s murder, and also with being a party to abduction and rape. But I think they’ll have a long wait. Lucy was strung out on so much resentment and self-disgust that when she broke, I think she broke for good. As the psychiatrist told me when I went to visit her, when a rubber band snaps, there’s really not a lot you can do to make it whole again. If her mother ever visited her, he told me, then maybe she’d have a chance. In that case, I said, she didn’t have any chance at all.

  I actually went down to Ravensey to see her. In the chaos that followed her husband’s fall I wasn’t able to talk to her, to apologize for the things I’d had to say, and to commiserate with her for the loss of her daughter, Emma. I really did take the train this time, all the way, and once again I walked through the quiet village. I passed the woman from the post office, who lowered her eyes and nodded at me. When I got down to the house I found some workmen just packing up their van, parked on the gravel drive. They told me that Mrs Bradley was round the back. I walked round and found her, at the bottom of the lawn, wearing gardening gloves, tending a big fire that was cracking and spitting viciously. I told her how sorry I was. I said a few words about Emma, and about her husband, but Mrs Bradley neither heard me, nor saw me, nor gave any sort of recognition of the fact that I was standing there, speaking to her. She just went on tending her fire. Nevertheless, I said what I had to say. Then, just before leaving her, I looked up at the horse chestnut behind her, where I’d sat a few days earlier, thinking about Lucy, wondering if a girl really could do such a thing to her sister. Mrs Bradley saw my glance and turned to face me with a look I’ll never forget.

  The branches above her head were empty.

  * * *

  I didn’t have a lot to do in the days that followed. I hung out with Nicky quite a bit, staying up late a few nights talking. I told him about Shulpa and he didn’t mind. He said that he looked forward to my finding out what a pain she was, so that there would be two people in the world who didn’t think the sun shone out of her admittedly shapely arse. I also spent a lot of time in the gym, and went with Sal to watch Des’s fight at a hall in Lewisham. He was put in with a guy from Deptford, and even though the guy had a lot of local support, he only lasted four rounds. Barely more than I had. Des was made up, and there was a good party afterwards, following which I drove Sal home. I felt slightly awkward as we pulled up outside her house, and stopped my car, but when I turned to look at her we both burst out laughing. Sal kissed me on the cheek and ran upstairs.

  ‘You don’t get that lucky twice in a lifetime, Billy Rucker,’ she said.

  I spent some time in the office, doing chores. I spent some time chatting to Ally, about this and that, and managed to get past the reserve she was showing towards me. Thinking of Andy Gold made me just shake my head. I saw him too. I had to go into the station a couple of times to give statements, and then add to them. Curtis was charged, and was looking at fifteen years, minimum. Juliet Chortney and her husband the same. Iris Chortney didn’t know anything, of course, and I asked Andy if I could break the news to her. The poor woman was so horrified when I explained everything that she couldn’t speak. She started to tremble and eventually to cry, but she got it together to tell me that it wasn’t for them, not for her daughter-in-law, not even for her son.

  ‘For those girls,’ she managed to say. ‘For those girls.’

  * * *

  When I got to the gallery on Regent’s Park Road, where Faber were hosting the party, the place was already quite busy. People were chatting, saying hello, and generally being gregarious in a muted way suitable for such an event. I was on my own, having told Shulpa that I didn’t really want her to come. Our first fight. The gallery was a roomy, bright space, with polished beech flooring and soft music in the background. I drifted around, with the obligatory glass of cheap white in my hand, looking at the posters Faber had put up; huge shots of each of the poets, accompanied by a short poem, or an extract, printed in large type. I had to admit that while it all seemed a bit glitzy to me, the concept did seem to work. There was definitely a buzz about the event, with several people taking pictures and someone from Radio 4 making a feature.

  I strolled around, picking up the odd book, flicking through the pages. I may have been biased, but nothing I read seemed to have the immediacy of my brother’s work. I chatted away to the editor for a while, a woman I’d met before, but I didn’t talk to any of the poets. They were surrounded by their friends, some of them laughing, some of them having serious discussions. They didn’t know me. Eventually I found myself gravitating back towards Luke’s stand, where I stood to the side by myself, feeling slightly foolish at being there on my own, almost wishing Shulpa had come after all. At least I’d have someone to go to dinner with after. It all seemed, well, something of a disappointment after all the expectations I’d had, and I found myself feeling slightly let down. I was looking at my watch, wondering how much longer to give it, when a middle-aged lady in an expensive suit took hold of my wrist.

  ‘Congratulations,’ the lady said. ‘Your work is lovely. I bought your wonderful book, and I was wondering if you would do me the honour of signing it.’

  I thanked the lady, and smiled. I was halfway through explaining when something else caught my attention. It was two eyes, green like river moss in the sun. Sharon walked up slowly, and waited quietly until I’d finished. The lady, almost tearful, took her leave after five minutes, clutching the book to her chest as if it were the Bible.

  ‘Hi.’

  She had a copy of Luke’s book too, folded between her hands. A smile appeared on her face, like a candle flame blown out before it could take. I couldn’t look at her.

  ‘Hi,’ I said. ‘Thanks for coming. It’s good of you to come.’

  Sharon nodded. She took a look round the room. ‘I can’t believe I said I wasn’t going to come here,’ she said. ‘I was always going to come. Always.’

  I took a sip of wine. ‘Whatever. Anyway. I’m glad you did.’ I glanced at my watch. ‘I’m going to head off soon though, I think.’

  ‘I know I’m late,’ Sharon said, stopping me with a hand on my sleeve. ‘But I was with Luke. I’ve just come from there.’

  ‘Oh,’ I said. I put the empty glass on a table and stuck my hands in my pockets. ‘It’s OK, the ward, don’t you think? Not as nice as Lewis House but it won’t be long before they move him back. I think they told me the 27th—’

  ‘I’ve been telling him what a fuck up I’ve been making of my life recently.’

  I met Sharon’s eyes but she looked down at her feet. I sighed. ‘Listen, you don’t have to say that, Sharon—’

  ‘Oh but I do, Billy. I really do.’ Sharon let out a harsh laugh. She went a long way inside of herself and then looked at me. ‘You haven’t asked me how I am,’ she said.

  It was because I didn’t want to hear it. ‘I’m sorry,’ I said, with a little sarcasm. ‘How are you? How’s…Ronan?’

  ‘Fucked if I know.’ She left a slight pause, possibly for me to ask. I didn’t. That laugh again. ‘We split up,’ she said.

  I didn’t mean to react but I couldn’t help it. I hoped Sharon didn’t see my reaction. Once again I thought about what Nicky had said. I wondered if he could have been right? Had she realized? If so, was I going to blame her? Could I just forget it? I looked at my fingernails.

  ‘What happened? I mean—?’

  ‘He dumped me.’

  ‘Oh,’ I said.

  Again, I hoped she didn’t see what my reaction was. Sharon’s eyes narrowed. She seemed to be waiting for me to ask why, but once again I didn’t say anything. What did it matter? Again I made to go.

  ‘He said he didn’t believe it,’ she said.

  ‘Believe what?’

  ‘What I felt for him. He said I’d never really loved him. He said it wasn’t him I wanted.’ Sharon was trying to look at me. ‘He said he thought I was using him as an
excuse. A get-out clause.’

  I did look at her. ‘From what?’

  ‘You,’ she said. She turned her head towards the huge blow up of Luke, sitting on an upturned fishing boat. ‘From you, and from him.’

  ‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Oh. Look, I’m sorry. I mean…’ Something rose in my chest. ‘What, what do you think? About…what he said. Is he right? I mean, how do you feel…?’

  At that moment a young woman wearing large round glasses walked up to us and introduced herself as Lisa March. She was from the Express, she said, and had been trying to get in touch with me. I nodded. She said she wanted to do a profile of Luke, which would really help his book sales, and then began to ask both myself and Sharon the questions I had anticipated when I first knew about Luke’s book. I answered her questions but I knew what she wanted. Eventually she got to the point.

  ‘And, it must have helped you get over what happened to…well to have each other. I understand that you, you are friends.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And, is there any more to it than that? I mean, I think our readers would find it very heart-warming to know that you have, have found—’

  ‘Why did you think to ask us this?’ I said. The woman ran a hand back through her hair.

  ‘Well, I don’t know really, I think someone at Faber may have mentioned something. I mean it’s nothing to be ashamed of, is it? What with your brother in a…I think it would make a lovely story. I…’

  My eyes had found Sharon’s, and she was staring straight back at me. Her mouth opened slightly. I couldn’t hear the girl talking any more. Then, suddenly, I saw Sharon. I saw her with Ronan, walking towards her flat, holding onto him, her head against his arm.

  ‘Well, is it true? The publicist at Faber did seem pretty sure…’

  I saw her, holding onto him, fishing for her keys, and then the door close behind them. I saw the light go on and the figure in the window. I saw the light go off.

  ‘She’s wrong,’ I said, turning back to the journalist. ‘Sharon and I are friends. I’m afraid that there’s nothing more to it than that.’

  ‘I see,’ Lisa March said. ‘I see.’

  * * *

  Ten minutes later I was sitting in the front seat of my car. I’d intended driving down to see my brother, to tell him how the whole thing had gone. But I changed my mind. I didn’t feel like it. I sat for a while. Then I took the irises that I’d bought him from the back seat, and I walked up through the Lock, where the last of the Sunday stalls were being taken down by council workers. No one else was about. I walked through and up to the bridge. When I got to the High Street I turned right, towards the tube, and when I got there I waited for the lights to change. When the signal came, I crossed, and then I was standing outside a greasy spoon cafe, opposite the Marks and Spencer store, with its giveaway green store fronting and its deep porch, refuge for many a homeless or tired person, resting in their weariness from the heat of the day. I stopped for a second, and looked at the small pile of flowers that had been placed there. There were several bunches of roses, and some lilies, and two bunches of cheap, yellow daisies, all neatly laid out in the doorway. I guess there must have been seven or eight bunches in all.

  She was a pretty girl, with an open, sunny expression and bright green eyes, smiling up at passers-by when they gave her money. She had a lovely face, a lovely, lovely face, and I decided that the absence of freckles actually suited her. Not everyone needed freckles. I waited for some cars to go by and then I stepped out into the road.

  I left the flowers in the doorway at the foot of the pile, and was about to cross back over when a ticket on one of the others, a bundle of roses, caught my eye. It said, ‘To our darling Donna. You are always with us. Mum and Dad.’ I picked the roses up and crossed the road again. I stood outside the cafe, just looking over at the empty doorway, listening to the tired sounds of the evening, finding it hard to leave. After a minute or so an old bag lady shuffled up. Carefully, she moved some of the flowers aside, and sat, setting her weight down on the pavement like a mother hen. Then she was comfortable. I watched as she gathered her belongings around her, huddling herself beneath an old duvet with a flower pattern just visible beneath the grime. I stayed for another minute, as she pulled out a penny whistle and began to blow. I don’t know why she was bothering, there was no one about. I stood there until a slight breeze moved past me and I shivered, wishing I had a coat. I rubbed my arms. Then I dumped the bouquet of flowers I was holding in the nearest bin and walked back to my car, with the thin sound of the music fading away behind me.

  First published in the United Kingdom in 2000 by Pan Books

  This edition published in the United Kingdom in 2017 by

  Canelo Digital Publishing Limited

  57 Shepherds Lane

  Beaconsfield, Bucks HP9 2DU

  United Kingdom

  Copyright © Adam Baron, 2000

  The moral right of Adam Baron to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN 9781911591627

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Extract from Growth of the Soil by Knut Hamsun (copyright 1921) is reproduced by kind permission of the author and Souvenir Press Ltd

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